New Year’s Challenge 2021
This January, I jumped on the #goals bandwagon, putting together a small group of ladies who wanted to kick start the year. Although, I will say, very firmly, I am a fan of habits, rather than goals so we focused our efforts around small or large changes to your week that could become good habits.
Given that we were a group of ladies in an exercise class, it’s no surprise that the goals were health and wellness related, both mind and body.
100 oz of water every day
Adding more spinach in to the diet
Healthy Snacks
Meal prep for yourself and children
Meditation
Reading
Regular workout schedule during the week and/or yoga
Limiting alcohol during the week
Getting outside every day
An extra challenge: putting aside time for self care.
We met 5 times over the month of January and the accountability was everything. Once you are accountable to a group for that many weeks it really starts to stick. I’ve heard in many places that it takes 21 days to make a habit. Now I’m not in the science of habits, but that feels about right… We all had our good weeks and bad weeks. Going back to work after maternity leave or holiday days off, certainly throws a wrench in the “plan” but adapting, preparing the best you can, and adjusting the next week is what it’s all about.
Meal prep became a huge topic of conversation among the group, sharing tips and ideas for how to meal prep. I’ve never gotten good at fully prepared meals for the week but this is my approach on Sundays. Making big batches of:
Brown rice and/or quinoa
Boiling about 3 lbs of chicken (lunch time for adults, give to kids in pasta or quesadillas or on it’s own, easy salad for lunch or dinner)
Roasted a large sheet pan full of broccoli
Perfectly balanced and delicious lunch = 1/2 cup of brown rice + 1 cup of broccoli + 3-4oz of chicken or other leftover protein + 1/4 avocado
In addition to all the wellness challenges we had killer workouts each week focusing on core tightening movements and improving posture and building real strength.
It was an absolute blast and I hope you will join us for one another month this year!
