Happy New Year Everyone! Welcome back to another blog. The New Year is here. For most of us it is a temporal landmark - a moment in time that promotes a break from the past and a sense of renewal and change for the future. Many of us make resolutions - like losing weight, eating healthier, exercising more...etc. The truth is most resolutions - 64% fail by the end of January - and 92% fail within a year. Further, 80% of the weight gained over the year happens during the holiday season - the average being 5lbs. This weight keeps piling up each year - and before we know it, we have 20 or more pounds to lose. "Similar to New Year resolutions generally, and despite the benefits of exercise, people tend not to adhere to general exercise goals set throughout the year, with more than 50% reporting physical inactivity after the first month of initiating an exercise goal." Why is this when we are going into the year with such determination? Are we doomed to fail? What can we do to improve our success? Let's delve in.

We've all been there. We are excited for the new year and what it could bring. We tend to set unrealistic goals, often without a clear plan, without accountability, and without a "back-up" strategy when the unexpected happens. Things get hard and we stop. We get discouraged and fall back to our old habits. Nothing gets better and our health gradually worsens. We yoyo on diets and gain the weight back - and then some. We know we can do better, but how do we change? 

Your mindset is what HAS to change. This is hard, but doable. One way that has been proven to work is creating a morning routine. We all have one, but is it intentional? We often just let the day "happen" to us. Many of us feel burnout, stress, and have a tendency to procrastinate - I'll start tomorrow. However, the more stress you can mitigate, the better. One way to do that is to lower the number of micro-stressors accumulated during the day. Avoid loading yourself up on these first thing in the morning. Here are a few: your alarm goes off - small stressor. You hit the snooze. Alarm goes off again - another stressor. You scroll on your phone through social media - easy enough to find things to stress you here. You may respond to an email or text that can be stressful. By the time you've gotten out of bed, you've already accumulated as many as 8-10 micro stressors. You jump in your car and someone cuts you off. Things may not go well at work. The stress of life happens - your bucket of micro stressors is practically full. You have no reserves. It doesn't take much to push you over the edge. What if you started your morning differently? 

Take control of your day. Could you commit to 5 minutes of stress-mitigation BEFORE you head out the door? Take 2 minutes to do breathwork. Take 3 minutes to do some yoga. Listen to healing tones while you do this - or create your own with humming. This is proven to activate your parasympathetic nervous system - primarily the Vagus nerve - which shuts down the sympathetic nervous system. They can't be on at the same time! You can also stimulate other nerves in the parasympathetic nervous system by using lateral eye movement. Lie on your back. Tilt you head slightly back and look to the right with your eyes for about 30 seconds. This tells your brain you are safe. You may yawn, sigh, or swallow. Do this to the other side as well x 30 sec. Try this for a week and let me know how you feel. This is FREE. How can you show up and be your best self if you don't take the time to CARE for yourself? Set yourself up for success.

Here are some tips to help you achieve success:

• Set a small achievable goal - if your ultimate goal is to get your 12,000 steps in and you are currently only around 3,000, set an achievable goal of 4,000 steps at first. Gradually build on that. Park at the end of the parking lot when going to the grocery store to get an extra 1,000 steps in, for example. In January 2020, I set a goal of getting my cholesterol down - not knowing at that time cholesterol isn't the problem - and following the Greeks started taking 2Tbs of raw HP-EVOO (high polyphenol extra virgin olive oil). I did this for the first 2 weeks, then increased to 4Tbs. I was amazed at how GOOD I started feeling and 5 weeks in dropped 10lbs without doing anything else. Let me tell you, this was all it took for me to start diving into the research to figure out how and why. I dropped 50lbs that year and have never looked back. Many times, you embark on a journey that opens new doors and changes your life for the better. I have continued to dive deep into the latest research and strive to bring this information to the public through my blogs. I am thrilled to be able to help others reverse chronic disease and achieve their health goals. Check out my personal journey here.
• Create a plan - planning how to achieve your goal is key. If your goal is eating healthy homemade meals, set aside an afternoon to meal prep for the week, for example. 
• Be consistent - If your goal is getting your steps in, don't let rainy weather stop you. Put on a raincoat. Go to the mall or Walmart and get your walking in. Don't find an excuse to get out of it. 
• Don't beat yourself up - if you fail to do what you set out to do, don't beat yourself up - pick yourself up and start again. If you have this idea that you have to be perfect or nothing, you will not succeed. That perfectionist attitude will lead to failure. Be KIND to yourself. Encourage yourself as you would a friend.
• Habit-stack - Build your goal into your daily routine, so it naturally fits in. Nail it. An example is 5 min of exercises in your living room - pushups, squats, lunges, yoga, etc. Do this while your coffee is brewing. This has been shown to spillover and spur more movement. You start feeling better and want to move more.
• Reward yourself - when you actually do what you've set out to do celebrate these small wins and reward yourself with some small treat - a new pen, flowers for your table, a magazine you wouldn't normally allow yourself, etc. I love art - so fresh drawing paper and pencil are fun.
• Re-affirm your goal - each morning, make that commitment to yourself - because you are worth it.
• Track your progress - if you started with 4,000 steps and now you've increased to 10,000, and your goal was 12,000, get excited! You're almost there! You should be feeling better, which motivates you to continue.
• Have a support system - get a friend to do it with - go to gym with - hold you accountable - or get a health coach - like me. My clients are enjoying great success in their journey to health. One client is in the process of writing her personal story that I'll be publishing in a blog soon. 
• Implement stress control - do some breathwork in the morning - start with 1 minute. This goes a LONG way in mitigating the micro stressors that accumulate and bombard us all day - driving us to have that glass of wine in the evening.
• Get Sleep - just making this one change can impact your life in a profoundly positive way. We can handle what is thrown at us much better when we are rested. We can stick to our goals and not give in to sugar cravings, be less reactive in stressful situations, etc. Further, sleep is when your body repairs itself. If you aren't making this a priority, how will you heal?

I challenge you to do this for 2 weeks. See how you feel and comment. If you begin to feel better, see if you can keep it going through January - report back in a comment and let's beat the odds!

• Implement a 5-minute morning anti-stress strategy of breathwork and stretching/movement/yoga.
• Start taking 2Tbs HP-EVOO every morning before you have coffee. I like mine with fresh squeezed lemon. See how you feel in a couple weeks. When your body responds and you start feeling good, it spurs you to continue.
• Progress to also taking 2Tbs, before bed to improve sleep - it has some melatonin on top of all the other phytonutrients, vitamins and polyphenols.

I am graduating clients all the time, so I have room in my schedule - if you need some help trying to figure out what to do to change your health, reach out to me on email: julie@thevirginoliveoiler.com. 

So, until next time my friends…Drink, Drizzle, Digest HP-EVOO at least 4T raw daily, - use more for cooking and drizzling/pouring onto your food - eat the rainbow of organic or wild-sourced or organic veggies (7-9 C) and low-glycemic fruits (to get the rainbow of gut microbes!) - eat wild-caught, pasture-raised, grass-fed - get plenty of sunshine - supplement magnesium, zinc, vitamin D3 + K2 - get your trace minerals and electrolytes with good sea salt - Celtic is hand-harvested and Himalayan was formed before plastics - eat foods high in lutein - drink your body weight in oz of water - get a good pre/probiotic - consume digestible and indigestible fiber for your gut microbes - adaptogens (such as mushrooms) and methylation donors (kale, beets, spinach, cruciferous, lion’s mane…), marjoram, rosemary, oregano, parsley and other herbs to detox, enhance overall health and reverse aging and disease - exercise your body and mind - add a few minutes of mindful meditation to your day to combat stress - take a hot Epsom salt bath and follow with a cold shower/ice plunge - practice “earthing” as an anti-inflammatory - remove EMF (electromagnetic frequency) devices and blue light - use IR (infrared) from incandescent lighting, non-toxic candle or light a fire to enhance sleep and...turn off the light!!   #HP-EVOO