TIPHealth® is dedicated to Improving Treatment and Medication Adherence in America

It is very hard to change a habit, even a small one. Let us say I wanted to change something—anything.  I would need to post reminders on the mirror. When I caught myself doing it the old way, I’d stop and start the new habit and routine. I’d ask my friends and partner to remind me about the new habit I wanted to create.  

Eventually, if I did it enough times, it would become my new routine.  You have to really care to put in all that effort to change a habit.

The crucial point here is how important motivation is to change a health behavior.  Because it takes a lot of hard work and often a lot of sacrifice. You have to really want to bring something into being.  Deeply, truly, honestly—otherwise it is  too easy to slip  back into the “same old, same old.” 

Whenever I work with people who say they want to change something about their health and well-being, become more grateful, start of maintain a physical therapy regimen—and they don’t do it, I tell them the health change failed to pass the “I really want it” test.  Because if you really want it, you’ll keep at it—despite setbacks, interruptions, pain and sidetracks.  

That is why it’s so important to only pick something that you really care about.  

Jean Borysenko, Ph.D. encourages us to “go beneath the surface to find our soul resolutions, which are based on saying yes to your deepest longings… goals rooted in what really matters are far easier to keep than facile resolutions that roll off the surface, right down the drain.”  

What health issue do you care enough about to apply the necessary elbow grease?