If you’ve gone through my free 9 Day, Level Up Your Health Challenge, you’ll know that the 2 most important steps you can take to build a strong, positive healthy habit is to:
1. Do the action in micro-sized steps, and
2. Do it daily until the action has sunk deep into your subconscious and you do it without thinking.
For some habits, like drinking more water, a habit can form in as little as 10 days, for others, like doing daily sit-ups, it can take up to 6 months.
You’ve heard it a thousand times: eat whatever you like, but in moderation. (Queue sound of crickets singing in the night time stillness…)
I don’t know about you, but to me advice like that is pretty much a waste of time.
So… let me get this right: you’re saying, whatever I want in moderation?
What on earth does moderation even mean anyway?
Is it once a day, twice a week, monthly or twice a year?
Is moderation of mars bars the same as moderation of avocado?
Mother-in-law: “Tell me, these vegan chocolate truffles you’re going to put on your blog… are they easy to make?”
Me: “Well that depends. What do you think about getting melted dark chocolate all over your hands?”
Mother-in-law scoffing: “What? A problem with getting chocolate on my hands?” + Slightly evil laugh. “That my dear… will not be a problem.”
So the morel of this story is, if you don’t mind spending 10 minutes indulging in a little chocolate messiness, then these decedent dark chocolate truffles are relatively easy to make.
“Don’t eat that chocolate cake. Don’t eat that chocolate cake.” I chanted to myself desperately while I sat on the floor each night with my back against the wall staring at the fridge that held the very thing I was trying to stop myself from eating.
But no matter how hard I tried, it always ended the same. Me eating the chocolate cake… and feeling like a complete failure… yet again.
I felt totally out of control.
How is it possible that the one thing that I was trying sooooo hard to not do was the one thing that I couldn’t resist?
Many of the clients I work with come looking for complete health renovation. They want Hollywood beach bodies yesterday. And they’re willing to go on almost any diet and slash almost every unhealthy habit that stands in their way.
While that’s an admirable ambition, the sad truth is that this approach just doesn’t work over 95% of the time (and if you don’t believe me, just check out the studies that show the success rates of diets (1). Hint:…they’re dismally low).