Mind and Body Fitness by the Sparkle Coach Setting the boundaries will help you to make time for yourself

WHETHER YOU’RE stuck in the rat race of career or a busy home and family life, it can be hard to find the time to eat well, move more and to sleep, but you can make time by saving time.

We put enormous pressure on ourselves to do everything and be everything for everyone and when it comes to our own health and fitness, we just want a quick fix. But by implementing simple boundaries in your life to save yourself time we can rediscover focused time to exercise, rest and to focus on your core values.

The first boundary is self-discipline and taking responsibility for our own journey by committing to take action.

This can feel empowering or at times, bitter-sweet as it is easier to blame others or external factors. But we must start from within and whilst certain situations may not be our fault, what we can do is begin to take control by tracking our behaviour so we can become aware of areas we are strong in and where we are neglecting and need to turn our attention to.

Writing out our goals that are aligned with our core values is proven to help us stay on track as well as how to reduce certain triggers. Make sure you drill down into the specifics of your goal to start with realistic ‘wins’ such as ‘get fit’ could be a larger ‘aim of improving holistic fitness.’

So break it down into nutrition, rest/ recovery and activity and then drill down into your weaker area e.g. Total fitness includes cardiovascular and muscular endurance and strength. So focus on a goal within that such as improving muscular strength through lifting weights to increase hypertrophy. As we train with our mental kettlebell before we get on to our body, we can begin to mentally de-clutter our lives and minds.

There might be certain avoidable triggers such as places or people you can disassociate from or limit contact with these people, reduce stressors at a certain place or break habit chains which stimulate negative emotions. Once we have jotted out our weekly schedule and outcome goals, next up is to plan our days to incorporate our core goals through ‘mini wins’.

It’s important that our days where possible allow for time for activities/movement, rest/sleep (refocus time), relationships and refuelling our bodies through nutrition.

Don’t neglect the rest periods because building in mindfulness each day, which combines science and therapy, can be so powerful, not as an ‘extra’ but as an integral part of our wellbeing.

It’s not about a dramatic change over night but a gradual transformation by tracking our daily wins to keep motivated and checking in weekly with an accountability buddy or ideally a personal trainer to see how we can adjust or improve areas gradually for the day or week ahead.

By making these healthy swaps, no matter how small it may seem at first will allow you to have more time to exercise, eat and rest well to transform your mind and body fitness.