Why New Year, Same You Is The Best Way To Achieve Your Health Goals

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE resolution setting. In fact, I do it all year round- but there are 2 times of year I get extra into it: January and September. 

Something about the symbolism of a new year (or school year….even if you’re no longer in school!) seems ripe for cultivating new habits and manifesting (and acting on) the life you want to have. 

What’s Wrong With New Year, New You

My problem with this time of the year is the way diet culture pervades the marketing and masquerades as health. You don’t need to be an entirely new you to have a great new year- and making huge goals that don’t fit with your ability to achieve them is just setting yourself up for disappointment and the consequential shame spiral that always follows when we ourselves don’t follow through. 

To be clear- when diet culture is involved, the fault is NEVER with you- yet culture makes us believe we need to look a certain way or weigh a certain number even when that number is at DIRECT ODDS with what’s really healthiest for us- just because society calls that desirable.

Set Goals That Actually Concern Your Health

If you want to cut out a whole food group because an influencer told you it’ll make you look like her and you equate that with being healthy- it’s probbbbably not in your actual best interest (of course, there are ALWAYS exceptions-if you have a medical condition and your doctor recommends a certain diet, then it sounds like that actually might be a positive change for you).

If at first you wanna start counting calories because you want to lose weight, remember that your body cannot tell the difference between famine and diet- and restricting yourself can often lead to more weight gain in the future. Our bodies are GOOD at gaining weight and have a tough time losing weight for an evolutionary reason: because our ancestors went through famine- a LOT- and they had to get good at preserving ourselves without access to regular meals. When you f with your genetically predisposed weight set point, you mess with your bodies ability to take care of itself and function. (Don’t believe me? Read more about metabolism and homeostasis from on of my fave registered dieticians here).

TLDR; when setting a resolution about your health….just make sure it’s actually about your health.

Letting Go Of Diet Culture

I hear you, the tough part comes when our genetically predetermined set point (which is a range) doesn’t fit with the beauty standard. Very few of us are 6 ft tall and rail thin. Those people are beautiful- but so are you, regardless of what size you wear.

Often, we make goals that are 100% appearance based because we equate health to beauty. It can be confusing to separate the two, but they are different. Yes, if you feel your best, you’ll likely look your best- but the cruel joke of the diet industry is that it oftentimes tricks us into eating patterns that make us feel worse on the quest for a “perfect” body- and thus the cycle continues. When we associate exercise with our bodies never being good enough- obviously you’re not going to enjoy it. This SUCKS because exercise is one of our best tools to feel confident, improve our mood, and enjoy being in our bodies.

Conclusion

You’re perfectly entitled to your aesthetic goals. I always want to make it known that for all my talk of neutrality and accepting our bodies- I feel the desire to continually “improve” my own just as much as the next gal, but I do my imperfect best to recognize that that’s not the thing that will bring satisfaction. What’s really satisfying is being comfortable in my skin even after enjoying fun holiday foods and even when I miss a workout.

Just so we’re clear, if changing your body is important to you this year, you don’t need to feel shame about it. There’s enough of that already going around. I just ask that you simultaneously examine and unpack your fat-phobia. That might seem out of left field if you’re unfamiliar with the concept (unsurprising in a world that uses fear of large bodies to promote a specific type of beauty despite that not actually being related to health).

If moving mindfully and without body shaming is part of your gameplay for the new year, I’m here for you with a 10 day free trial to Helen Phelan Studio. There are nearly 200 on demand classes with 3 new classes added each week and we always focus on finding alternative whys to hit your mat that will make you look forward to exercise- not dread it.