I have asked myself many times, especially when I wanted someone close to me to improve their habits, a serious mistake because if I have learned something is that you can "motivate a person”, you can teach them to make the best healthier recipes, you can go on a walk/jog with them but all of that will be useless if the person isn’t willing to make the change themselves. You can "drag" a person for a couple of weeks, but at some point, they will stop. But it doesn't just happen with training or eating healthy, I feel that it happens with everything in life, from getting rid of a bad habit of making any decision.
Motivating someone is fine, but I feel that within each person there is a "click" that hooks you and that will keep you motivated and leads you to the discipline that will eventually substitute your motivation. That's why it is important to know what some of those "click" moments are in different people. That way you are able to identify your click moment if you haven't done it yet.
But first I would like to clarify that when I refer to a healthy lifestyle, I mean balance and I know balance can be a very broad concept, but I want to share my concept: balance is leading a healthy lifestyle but also continuing to enjoy your life. You are indeed able to maintain that lifestyle while allowing you to live in the real world.
Now let's move on and get to the "clicks"
Obviously, that "click" varies a lot between people and especially in the ages of the people you ask:
For example, the "click" of elderly people (seniors) to whom I have asked this, tend to be times when they have felt bad or have faced health issues. Especially in today’s day in age people refer to them as the “high-risk population”.
The “click” of younger people is usually motivated by a physical aspect, and with dealing with moments of stress. Some particular circumstances can include a breakup or moments of stress in their jobs which has led them to explore new challenges where they feel that their limits and their minds get stronger.
Finding your “click” is as important as the way in which you are going to direct it. For example, your “click” may at first be motivated by a "negative" moment in your life such as a moment of anxiety or illness, but the real momentum is when you start to feel good with your new habits. That feeling that you get to be able to be healthier, feeling more energetic, by having a more positive mindset, that is the real “CLICK”. Once you feel that, your life changes and there is no going back.
Personally, my click was the day I went to a gym for the first time, I remember doing 15 minutes on the elliptical and getting dizzy! Only with those 15 minutes, my body could not resist it. I was about to be 21 years old and on the elliptical next to me there was a 65-year-old, go after it!
At that moment the “click” turned into a reality and I challenged my habits because indeed I wanted to take that step and figure out how far I would be able to go. I resisted more and more each time, I felt more motivated because I felt that I was a new person, and I continued to do it daily. To this day every time I train and feel like giving up, I remember that at that very moment most people give up! But I will not! I continue and I am motivated! It's been about 7 years since that. I've discovered things about myself that I didn't know I was capable of and I fell in love with myself all over again!
Now I hate the elliptical! But I love the benefits of living a healthy life.
♥ ️
