Welcome to Your New Healthy Lifestyle

One of our roles as your financial planner is to build and protect Wealth. We believe, having a good financial road map of where you are going is a form of financial health, fitness and wellness.

Being Healthy, fit and feeling well naturally aids financial health.

Being healthy makes it so much easier to plan finances, work hard, and set goals.

Whatever you want to call it, health, fitness and wellness can mean something different for each one of us. By definition, we know that getting healthy means living an active lifestyle and eating foods of nutritional value so our body can function at their best. However, these words can also bring up various emotions. For some who have mastered “the lifestyle”, perhaps those feelings include pride and accomplishment. For those who have not, getting healthy might be a huge, overwhelming task which can be scary and intimidating.

If you’re someone who lives an energetic lifestyle and eats right – even sometimes, or better yet most of the time – keep it up! Find new ways to challenge yourself. We encourage you to push your limits, keep getting better, leaner, fitter, stronger – but also, find the balance.

Being the perfect gym rat or nutritionally on-point 100% of the time is not realistic for most, and it does not have to be. When this becomes a long-term lifestyle choice, make it work for you and still have fun! Change up your workout routines, find new, healthy recipes for your family to try.

We will get more into detail about this later. It is a personal goal of mine to keep health and fitness fun and exciting!

But, if for you, this does not come nearly as easy, or if you have not yet found the key to making health, fitness, and nutrition work for your life, these five steps might be helpful.

Goals

Think about what you want from this. Set goals and be specific. Let your family, friends, and co-workers know what your goals are so they can support you.

Use visuals — pictures, motivational quotes plastered throughout your living space, car, office, and even on your phone background. Sometimes we are our only support; be prepared for that, too.

Know Where You’re Starting

Do not just weigh yourself. Take measurements. Even note the way you feel. Low on energy? Frequent stomach pains? Shortness of breath? Our body changes in many different ways, and for some, you may notice more inches lost than pounds shed, or an increase in energy level and less bloat. Constantly using our weight as a determinant of success can be incredibly frustrating. When you start the process, stay off the scale. Focus on how you feel, how your clothes fit, and if your endurance and energy are increasing.

Eat Right

Nutrition will make the greatest impact on your health, so we recommend this being the first step in your journey. It is okay to take small steps and focus on only making one change at a time. Start by increasing your water intake and dropping sodas and other sugary drinks. Then, decrease the amount of times you eat out or grab fast food. Finally, try to cut processed foods. If you are interested in a specific nutrition plan to follow, research “clean eating.”

There are numerous guides to follow, but here is what it breaks down to: eating whole, unprocessed, healthy foods. If it is packaged in a box with a cute, colourful label, it likely does not fit in this category. Learn to plan your meals based on your schedule and daily routines. That could include preparing your foods ahead of time so you will have quick meals and snacks available on the go. Do what works for you; finding the right method could be the result of trial and error, so do not let your first few days or weeks on the plan determine your success with it.

Move Your Body

Of course, getting fit means burning calories through activity! What can you do? What do you like to do? Walk, dance or lift weights? You want your workouts to be doable yet challenging, but also enjoyable and maintainable. Do you want to work out in the comfort of your home? Alternatively, will a gym inspire you to push yourself?

Do you like group exercise classes or prefer to work alone? Will you seek the guidance of a trainer or coach for accountability and motivation? Do some soul-searching to really consider what will be a feasible approach for you. Consult your physician if physical limitations will determine your ability to complete certain exercises. Most importantly, have an open mind. You might think something like a group boot camp class would be intimidating and too difficult, but after trying it, you could end up loving the challenge!

Celebrate Success

Reward yourself for progress and achieved goals. We are a society that uses food to celebrate. Break that habit, and instead consider earning something for yourself for each milestone. When you treat yourself, it becomes more enjoyable and we look forward to hitting that next milestone.

Eating right and working out might not be your favourite pastime, but it’s important to lead a healthy life.

Whether you are just getting started, wanting to maintain results, or push past a fitness plateau, follow these steps to begin or continue your fitness journey. Sometimes, we just have to reconsider what we are doing and push through our own limits.

A book called ‘The Richest Man in Babylon’ talks about paying yourself first as the key to financial success; others argue rewarding yourself for achieving small, then big, then large tasks you set in a healthy manner is just as important.

For us we think it is a balance, the first step may be to pay yourself first by training as soon as you like, for others it may be a simple realisation to do something, then planning, then action, then reward.

Based on the article by Ali Sulak, 22 September, 2015.

To book a no obligation appointment with our experienced financial planner please call (03) 6344 3899 or send us a message online.

Disclaimer:

These articles are of a general nature only and are not to be taken as recommendations as they might be unsuited to your specific circumstances. The contents herein do not take into account the investment objectives, financial situation or particular needs of any person and should not be used as the basis for making any financial or other decisions.

InterPrac FP directors and advisers may have investments in any of the products discussed in this article or may earn commissions if InterPrac clients invest or utilise and any services featured. Your InterPrac FP adviser or other professional advisers should be consulted prior to acting on this information. This disclaimer is intended to exclude any liability for loss as a result of acting on the information or opinions expressed.