5 Tough Love Tough Love Truths

Trust me, I know it's not easy to get this healthy lifestyle thing down! The truth is that it takes serious, conscious effort, and the sooner you embrace that fact, the better. Wishing it was easy will only leave you feeling frustrated and stuck in old habits time and time again. As the saying goes, the best things in life aren't easy and don't happen without a bit of struggle, trial and error and hard work. A willingness to face challenges head-on and work through them will allow you to be proactive in reaching your goals. Change — even positive change — can be scary, but it's time to get on board with it. Accepting – not fighting – the process to unleash your best, happiest self is key to starting off on a good foot!

It is time to quit the negative self talk once and for all. Whether you're telling yourself you look fat or you're not smart enough or fit enough – just STOP. Seriously, ENOUGH already! Instead, think about the person that you want to be, whether it's someone who's fit and works out regularly, or someone who has a healthy relationship with food. Visualize being this person, looking like this person and acting like this person. You can be anyone you want to be, but if you don't believe it and really see it first, then how will you get there?

"I like food too much." "I'm too busy to cook." "I can't afford to eat healthy." Sound familiar? Look, I'm not buying it. For whatever excuse you come up with, I can give you a solution. Try me! What excuses are holding you back from reaching your health goals? You keep getting stuck at work late? Buddy, set that alarm and wake up earlier to fit in a workout. Can't make time for breakfast each morning? Prep your meals ahead of time! Boil a batch of eggs in advance to grab on the go, chop up your smoothie or whey protein shake ingredients before bed. Let's be real, if you have 30 minutes to spare on Facebook, then you also have time to prepare a healthy breakfast or lunch for the next day. Got it?

Have you ever heard the phrase, "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail?" Well, it's true. Don't start each week hoping to find the time to make it to yoga or cook healthy dinners because, guess what? You never will! Decide in advance WHEN you will make it happen, then do it. Figure out which days you will exercise, go food shopping and plan your meals. You will soon see that the extra bit of effort will be more than worth it later. If you've already signed up for boot camp on Wednesday night, then you won't struggle with trying to decide whether or not you will make it to the gym — and you'll already know to bring that packed gym bag with you too! If you go grocery shopping on Sunday, you'll be prepared with things to eat when you come home from work on Monday exhausted. If you bring your lunch to work, you won't have to waste time (and money) figuring out what to eat. Once you get consistent with living a healthy lifestyle, so many areas of your life will become easier, like shopping for clothes and having more energy to get you through the day. So take the time to get organized and follow through on a plan (even a loose one), it will always be worth it!

When you have good intentions and healthy habits already in place, it's easy to get frustrated when you aren't seeing the results you want. If this is the case, you need to take a brutally honest look at yourself. It's great that you are dedicated to going to the gym, but are you actually pushing yourself while you're there? And what about your food choices: Is it possible that you're eating more than you think? Do you actually factor in the handfuls of Wheat Thins or pieces of chocolate you swipe from your co-worker's desk as part of your daily calorie allowance? Every bite counts…are you paying attention? And don't get stuck in the trap of comparing yourself to others. Just because your friend ate five slices of pizza and you ate four, doesn't mean that you made a good choice. So, tune-in, focus on what's best for you and figure out where you need to make adjustments.