Start Small.

This may seem silly, but the truth is that if we could all just “drink more water,” we would, right? And we’d reap the benefits: better looking skin, better memory, better digestion. The reality is that we’re a nation of self-gratifyers. We want something that tastes good right now. We crave sweet foods and drinks. Instead of setting yourself up for failure by trying to drink 64 oz of water a day, the recommended daily limit, start with something more doable – 6oz or 8oz. After all, some water is better than none at all.

Replace One Drink Per Day with Water

Although most people won’t commit to drinking a glass of water instead of their morning coffee, most can commit to replacing one soda or glass of OJ per day with water. This one change in your day could be the difference in having 8oz of water or none at all.

Make a Trip to the Water Cooler BEFORE Starting Your Day

If you’re like me and work in an office, you’re probably sitting at your desk all day. That’s why I recommend that you make sure to fill your water cup BEFORE sitting down. Once you’re seated (if you’re at all productive), you probably won’t be getting up for a while. Filling your cup before you start in on your email or task list is helpful because you’ll have your water on hand throughout the morning.

Drink Until You Can Drink No More

A good friend of mine taught me this trick once: when you start drinking water, don’t just take a sip–drink until you have to stop. In other words, continue drinking until you physically feel like you don’t want anymore. This will ensure that you’re not a “drive-by” water drinker, just taking small sips throughout the day. Rather, you’re a chugger. Don’t worry – chugging is a good thing. Before you know it, you’ll have downed at least 16 oz of water.

Get a Large Cup

Once you’ve been able to commit to 6 – 8 oz of water per day, go ahead and get a large cup for your water. Now, I’m not talking about those ginormous cups that hold 64oz of water?they’re daunting and will likely make you feel like a failure when there’s still water in the cup at day’s end. Instead, try a water cup that is 16 – 22 oz. This way,  you’ll feel good when you get through one cup and even better when you get through two.

And the winner, with number 247 is….KAMEKA! Way to go girl! You win a new Kleen Kanteen Water Bottle – complete with coozy! Just send me a message through Facebook with your contact information and I’ll get it out to you!

But WAIT…there’s more!

We actually had TWO Klean Kanteen Water Bottles to give away (see – this is why you should ALWAYS participate! you could get something for FREE!)! And the winner of the second bottle, with a number of 557 is…STACEY! Way to go! Same thing as above–just send me your address via Facebook and I’ll send you your prize!

Congratulations and thanks for doing the water challenge with me! I really think that 16oz per day is doable and that I can add this to my daily routine.

Next Week’s Challenge is SLEEP. The goal – for ONE WEEK is to get 8-9 hours of sleep per night. This week, though, I’ll have some action steps to help get you there.

Don’t forget to join our Facebook group to log your progress! Good luck!

To help with this, there is also an accompanying 50 day journal. For the purposes of this exercise, I’ll be committing to a 30-day program. I’ll determine after the 30 day course whether or not I want to continue.

The Benefits of Water

We all know how important water is for us, but Colbert calls water a “miracle cure” for many health problems since water is required for every function in the body.

Here are some other things you may not have known:

Water makes up 60% of your body weight.

Your lungs expel between 2-4 cups of water per day through normal breathing.

Water can respond to positive and negative emotion.

Day 1 Action Step:

• Replace one soft drink, tea or other with a glass of natural water

Interested in completing the 30 Day Challenge with me? Follow me on Twitter – let’s discuss our progress!

It’s January 12. Do you know where your New Year’s resolutions are?

Hopefully, they’re not on that crumpled up piece of paper that I see in your circular file. Hopefully, they’re taped to your refrigerator, hanging from your mirror, or posted to your front door. If they’re not, and you’re feeling a little discouraged about your goal, take heart – you are not alone and it’s not too late.

Today, I was driving home from work and I realized that it was already January 12th. I was still fat; I was still a smoker, and I was no closer to any of my goals than I was on December 31, 2009. I started to feel badly about myself, chalking 2010 as another year of unrealized goals. Then, I realized something even more important than that: as long as I had breath, I had hope. It wasn’t too late and I refused to give up on myself.

If you’ve stalled out on your New Year’s resolutions like I have, don’t give up. The way I see it, we can either look at the last 12 days as wasted, piss on ourselves and throw a pity-party OR we can take a deep breath and get back to it.

Shift Your Paradigm

The hardest part of any self-improvement plan is finding a plan that works for you. For instance, one of my goals this year is to lose 40lbs. I’ve tried Weight Watchers in the past with some success, but the plan just doesn’t turn me on enough to stick with it. In fact, I’ve come to understand that no diet and exercise plan ever will. Instead, I have to focus on getting healthy (specifically, disease prevention), not losing weight.  It sounds like trickery or word-play, but my reality is that I have to commit to shifting my manner of thinking about losing the weight. Otherwise, I will never see and appreciate the trees (each individual pound that I lose). I will only see the forest.

Create an Anchor

When I think about my husband, my ridiculously cute puppy, my siblings and my parents, I feel even more empowered to meet my goals. My family is an anchor for self-improvement. I am not seeking to improve for them; I am seeking to improve because of them. The idea of being able to enjoy them for as long as possible in a healthy physical and mental state is a powerful motivator. So, one thing that I’ve done when struggling with my goals is to create an anchor.

Think about just one wonderful by-product of meeting one of your goals. It doesn’t have to be your family – it could be anything. For example, another one of my goals is to decrease our debt this year. A wonderful by-product of losing weight will be saving money. I won’t be spending money on fast-food lunches, premium coffees or junk food all day. So, as an anchor for losing weight, I can use something seemingly unrelated like decreasing debt. Each day that I save money by not spending it on fast food, I will be eating a healthier packed lunch. I can watch the money pile up while watching the pounds fall off. An anchor gives you something to latch on to when you need motivation. Let your anchor help to keep you focused on your goal.

Celebrate Each Victory

Imagine this scene: you go all day without smoking/drinking a soda pop/eating fast food. Then, someone really pisses you off. A cigarette/soda/fast food starts to sound pretty good. You buy cigarettes/soda/fast food to deal with the stress. Ahhh!

And then the guilt sets in. Now you’ve ruined everything. You’ll never change. You might as well keep smoking/drinking soda/eating candy.

It’s easy to throw yourself under the bus and give up quickly with one slip-up. Instead of beating yourself up over a slip-up that occurred in one hour, why not celebrate the eight hours that you made it sticking to your guns? Celebrate each small victory. Clap your hands. Stomp your feet. Sing at the top of your lungs: “I’m bad! I’m bad! Who’s bad?” Do whatever you need to do to celebrate  yourself. Build your self-confidence and just start again.

I believe in you.

We can do it.

I chose the EX program from becomeanex.org to help myself with this problem. I have tried the program before, but did not do my due diligence with all of the steps. I was impatient.  Because of this, I never quit smoking, and I never escaped the cycle of addiction: craving, gratification, worry and guilt. This time, I believe that I will be completely smoke free by the end of January 2010.

The Program

This program is broken up into three phases, and I’m in Phase I. This entails re-learning the habit, identifying your triggers and tracking your cigarettes for three days. This process has caused me to really focus on when, where and why I smoke. This sort of mindfulness is really helpful. It increases my level of confidence. Simply, by understanding the process of when, where and why I smoke, I have started to feel like I have some control over the process. Also, tracking my cigarettes, like I am doing with Daytum, really puts my habit into perspective for me and in plain view for all the world to see. I’m embarrassed and enlighted, disgusted and empowered. Hoo-rah.

Tomorrow is my last day of tracking. On January 1, I’ll start Phase II – Separation. More on this to come. For now, my goal is to make it through tomorrow without smoking more cigarettes than I smoked today. I’m not going to push myself to beat it—just not to exceed it. So far, though, I am super excited to be working this process.

We started with nothing but an invitation. We came home with a new experience and a jewel that we had never known existed. That’s the beautiful thing about life:  there’s always something new. We just have to be willing to give AND receive.

I read a really fantastic article in today’s New York Times. A woman, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, received an interesting RX: give a gift a day for 29 days and live a healthier life. She didn’t have to spend money. Some of her gifts were just time, or a phone call, or a nice note to someone who needed it. She wasn’t cured, but her medical scans showed that her disease had stopped progressing. It appears that when we step outside of ourselves, we give our lives greater meaning. Studies show that altruism can be an antidote to stress.

The woman highlighted in the article now has written a book and also started a website: 29gifts.org. It seems like a simple principle and a very timely one, considering that the holidays are right around the corner.