Get Healthier, Better Manage Weight by Tapping into Your Strengths

Too many times, people can feel defeated in their quest for better health.

Maybe they have difficulty choosing the right foods or struggle sticking with an exercise program. Or maybe stress keeps getting in the way of their good intentions.

A lack of confidence can cause many to throw in the towel and give up early, impairing one’s ability to stay on the healthy weight loss track.

An important foundation of healthy living is to be able to tap into your own strengths that have served you well in other aspects of your life.

This enhanced confidence is called self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is the belief in one’s innate ability to carry out and achieve a specific new goal.

With this in mind, consider the following questions to help you reflect on the inner strengths that you use every day in other aspects of your life:

• What personal qualities have helped you tackle new challenges that have come your way?
• How would a family member, friend or boss describe your character strengths?
• What past accomplishments have you achieved using organizational or planning skills?
• When you learned a new skill, how did it improve when you practiced it and paid more attention to detail?

Most likely, you have had success with some of these skills, which means it will be easier for you to apply them to your health behaviors and healthy lifestyle goals.

If you’re someone who lacks confidence in your ability to improve your  lifestyle, I encourage you to think about the skills or character traits that have helped make you successful in your career or family life:

• Can solid project planning skills translate into healthier meal planning for you and your family?
• Can your attention to detail help you develop better food label reading skills?
• Do good computer skills make it easier to use fitness apps or research healthy recipes online?
• Can being a hard worker help you to persevere and take better care of yourself even when the going gets tough?

By borrowing skill sets from other areas of your life and applying them to your personal health behaviors, you can acquire the self-efficacy and feel more confident improving your lifestyle and embarking on a long-term weight management plan.

You can do this!

For step-by-step, personalized guidance to improve your health and better manage weight, check out my self-help book, Six Factors to Fit: Weight Loss that Works for You!

RK

Robert Kushner, MD