A perfect day of working out, eating healthy and finding “me” time sounds great in theory. But in reality, life happens during that perfect day and we’re lucky if we’re able to get to work on time and pick up carryout on the way home!

Life always finds a way to stick its’ foot out and trip up our best-laid plans.

Recapping chapter 4 in my book “Direction Not Perfection, Accountability and Coaching from Your Wine-Loving Dietitian”, I want you to understand that something has to give. On any given day you can be a great mom, a great wife, a great friend or a great employee, but you can’t be all of them on the same day.

The same thing goes for health and fitness. I run marathons, I cook and prep beautiful snacks and meals, I build stretching into my day, I hit 10,000 steps, I drink 64 fluid ounces of water, but I’ve never done it all on the same day.

As I said in podcast 16, making specific plans for your day and writing them down, is a great way to accomplish your goals. Knowing that the unexpected is bound to happen means you can be prepared both mentally and physically to roll with the punches and keep going.

Let’s Recap:

- Grant yourself permission to not be perfect: You will be better able to go with the flow and accept whatever each day brings you.

- Set priorities: Think about the things that your personality won’t let you go to bed without doing and get your workout, walk or food prep done first. Tired or not, the other things will still get done.

-Make a game plan: You can’t physically do everything in any single day so write down what you would like to accomplish in any given week and then figure out which days make the most sense to tackle them.

- Receive this message today. Something has to give!! Don’t just nod your head and agree, take it all in and see where this fits in your life. On any given day something important might be going on in your life – or multiple important things – but, because you’re giving yourself permission to not be perfect every day, you’ll quickly realize that most of your days are pretty darn good!

Journaling Questions:

1) How does your idea of perfection get in the way of living a healthy lifestyle?

2) What comes to mind when you think of giving yourself permission to relax… and to be OK with “good enough”?

3) Write down all of your responsibilities (but don’t use up a whole notebook!). When you consider priorities, where do healthy actions end up on your list?

Homework:

Your homework is to read back through your journaling questions and utilize this insight

Goal setting will always be part of your homework. Once a week write down your focus or goals for the week. Every Friday reassess them, tweak them or change them to fit your needs. It’s “Your journey, your way”.

Links:

Lindsey House:

www.healthaccountabilitycoach.com

www.facebook.com/houselifestyles

Direction Not Perfection, Accountability and Coaching from your Wine-loving Dietitian

https://braughlerbooks.com/store/books/direction-not-perfection