Monthly Archives: June 2012

The Wisdom of Allowing Things to Happen…

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The Master allows things to happen.
She shapes events as they come.
She steps out of the way
and lets the Tao speak for itself.
~The Daodejing

Post written by Leo Babauta.

This has been what I’ve been learning over the past couple of years. Allowing things to happen.

It goes counter to our usual instincts in Western society — we are doers, creators of our destiny, we make things happen … we don’t wait for it to happen! That’s what I was taught from an early age, in school and by every motivational sports movie I ever watched. So allowing things to happen is not my normal way.

I have never been one to be passive, to let things happen instead of making them happen, to let go of control of things.

But here’s what I’ve been learning:

  1. This control we think we have over our lives and our destinies … it’s an illusion. As the guy who had his life turned upside down by a heart attack, the woman who lost her father to death and had to drop everything, the family who lost their home to a hurricane, the entrepreneur that was doing well until the economy collapsed and no one was spending, the hard-working employee who was laid off when the economy tanked, the cyclist who was hit by a car, the car that skid because someone ran onto the road who had been obscured, the mom whose son has autism despite her doing everything right during pregnancy … it happens every day, where we think we’re in control but we’re really not. Do we control all the people around us who affect our lives so intimately? Do we control the overwhelming power of nature? There’s so much out of our control that what we think is control is really an illusion.
  2. To control your cow, give it a bigger pasture. This is a great quote from Zen Master Suzuki Roshi, talking about controlling your mind. I see the cow and her pasture as a form of allowing things to happen — instead of tightly controlling something, you’re opening up, giving it more room, a bigger pasture. The cow will be happier, will roam around, will do as she pleases, and yet your needs will also be met. The same is true of anything else — stepping back and allowing things to happen means things will take care of themselves, and your needs will also be met. And you’ve done no work.
  3. You have less stress, less to worry about. Imagine allowing things to happen naturally, and things work out, and all you did was smile and watch. You don’t have to worry about shaping things, about controlling something that doesn’t want to be controlled. You don’t have to push, and fix leaks, and put out fires. You just let things work on their own. They happen.
  4. Things will surprise you. Let’s say you’re allowing something to happen. You might want it to go a certain way, to a certain outcome. That’s your goal. But what if you let go of this idea? What if you say, “I don’t know what will happen.” (Btw, you really don’t.) What if you say, “Let’s see what happens.” Then things will happen, but not the way you planned. The outcome might be completely different than what you’d hoped for. But it can still be great, just different. It might even be wonderful, and surprising. Surprises are good, if we accept that things always change and that change is good.
  5. You learn how things work. Instead of trying to make things work the way you want them to work, just watch them work. You’ll learn much more about human nature, about the nature of the world, as you see things work without you controlling it. It might change you.

That’s all very good, Leo, you’re thinking. But that won’t put the food on my table.

Maybe you’re right. And so, don’t let me stop you from what you need to do. Carry on. I’ll just sit back and watch.

How to Learn A Language in 90 Days…

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‘If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.’ ~Nelson Mandela

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Maneesh Sethi of Hack The System.

I still remember the happiest moment of my life. I had decided to throw a party for my Italian friends while living in Florence, Italy. My friends didn’t speak any English, and I vividly remember throwing the party and trying to only speak in Italian. And then, someone asked me to tell a joke.

I don’t know if you know this, but telling jokes in another language is one of the most harrowing experiences you can imagine.

I began the joke. C’era una volta (Once upon a time) …

Halfway through the joke, I began to get flustered. I couldn’t remember the Italian word in the punchline. And 30 Italians were staring at me, waiting for the joke to end.

At the last minute, I remembered and completed the joke. I waited for the sound of crickets … but instead experienced a thunderous laugh and a round of applause. I had made dozens of Italians laugh, in their country, in their language.

Until today, that memory continues to be one of the happiest moments I’ve ever experienced. And it’s the reason that, over the last four years, I’ve studied languages and now speak five: English, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and German.

The Benefits of Bilingualism

Becoming bilingual opens up a whole new world—a world of different people, of different cultures, of different emotions.

Learning a second language has many cognitive benefits. For example, learning a new language has been shown to delay Alzheimer’s, boost brainpower, reduce cognitive biases, and even increase concentration and the ability to tune out distractions. Your ability to build better habits will improve by learning a new language.

But, more so than cognitive effects, the ability to speak a second language has a ton of social benefits. There’s bliss in having the ability to order food in the waiter’s native language, to eavesdrop on people in an elevator, to impress natives by speaking with and understanding them.

The coolest thing about learning your second language is that it makes learning a third, fourth, or fifth language much easier. The challenge isn’t in learning a new language, but rather learning how to learn a language. Once you know the techniques, you’ll be able to apply the same grammatical patterns and language techniques in every new language you learn. It’s for this reason that, while Italian took me 3 or so months to master, Spanish took only 2 months and Portuguese took just a few weeks.

Why most people are wrong about language learning

I studied spanish for several years in high school, and even got good grades on national exams. But one day, when I actually tried to speak the language, I suddenly realized.

Four years of studying Spanish in school, and I couldn’t even order a burrito.

So what went wrong? According to official standardized tests, I was an expert in Spanish. But I couldn’t even do the most basic of tasks!

The fact is that we not taught languages in the ideal way. Students study languages in huge groups and think that a few worksheets and grammar exercises will be enough to learn a language.

Yet almost no one actually learns to speak.

In actuality, by doing worksheets, we are practicing for just that—for worksheets. But if you want to learn to speak, well, you actually have to practice by speaking.

So when people try to learn to speak a language out of a book, or with Rosetta Stone, I try to show them that they won’t achieve their goals that way. If you want to speak, you have to practice speaking. And if you want to speak a language rapidly, well, you have to start speaking. A lot.

The Basic Strategy Of Rapid Language Learning

Learning a language can seem daunting, so I’m going to provide an overview of the general strategy, before we get into the specifics.

Here is the breakdown. We’ll go more in depth into each of these later on.

1. Get the right resources for learning: A grammar book, memorization software, and films/books.

2. Get a private tutor. You want one for at least a month. I recommend four hours/day.

3. Attempt to speak and think only in the new language. Every time you can’t remember a word, put that word into your memorization software. Practice your vocabulary daily.

4. Find friends, language partners, and other speakers of the language. Once you can have basic conversations with your private tutor, you need to find other partners. If you haven’t already, think about moving to the country where the language is spoken. Consider a group class. Practice continuously. Stop speaking English.

That’s the basic strategy. Again, this strategy is intensive, because learning a language in three months is a difficult task. If you’d prefer to learn the language more slowly or you don’t have the ability to move to a new country and practice 4-8 hours a day, then you can modify the plan. It is extremely important that you practice every day, however—20 minutes a day is much better than once or twice a week.

Some of these concepts are hard to understand through the written word, so I created a video series, just for Zen Habits readers, that teaches the steps to learn a language. Get the Hack The System Language Learning Videos here.

The Resources You Need To Learn A Language

In order to learn a language, you’ll need some items that you can practice with. Here are the resources I always use.

The Necessary Resources

A good grammar book. This is essential if you want to learn a language. I recommend Dover’s Essential Grammar series: the books are very cheap, concise, and thorough. When I lived in Italy, the Dover Essential Italian Grammar book became my bible. I read it everywhere, slept with it, and even memorized it.

A phrase book. This is similar to a dictionary, but for phrases. You can start memorizing full sentences and phrases, and you’ll naturally learn the individual words. I’ll talk more about memorization tactics shortly.

An online dictionary. For most romance langauges, I recommend http://wordreference.com. For German, try http://dict.cc. Google Translate can be useful, but it easily becomes a crutch. Use it sparingly.

A memorization app. You have to memorize vocabulary. I always put new words in my app, and practice them every night.

If you’re on a Mac, check out the app Genius. This genius app (pun intended) uses time-spacing techniques to test our knowledge. You’ll randomly be quizzed on words or phrases you are trying to learn, and the more often you make a mistake, the more often you’ll be tested. I recommend you put English on the left column and your desired language on the right, so that you’ll learn to speak in a new language, not translate from it. If you’re on a PC, I’ve heard good things about Anki.

Resources to learn from

A Private Tutor. I highly recommend getting an in-person private tutor through Craigslist or a nearby language school. However, if you can’t find anyone in your area or they are too expensive, check out Edufire.com. Edufire is a website that allows you to take private and group classes online over the Internet. Again, remember, private lessons are essential, so skip the group classes.

Free language partners and tutors. The Mixxer is an incredible resource. It’s a site that allows you to connect, via Skype, with language partners all over the world. Just choose your native language, and what you are trying to learn, and The Mixxer will find partners with opposite needs (who speak your target language and want to learn your native language).

At the beginning, online partners are a big help. Why? First, because chatting is much easier than speaking, so you get a chance to practice your language. Second, chat gives you a log of what you’ve been saying—and it makes it easier for your partner to correct you.

I use Couchsurfing.org and Meetup.com to find language partners and language meetups, no matter where I live. Check out Benny’s article to learn about finding language partners through Couchsurfing.

I don’t recommend Rosetta Stone. Rosetta Stone is incredibly slow. In Level 1, which takes 1-2 months to complete, you’ll only be familiar with the present tense. This is not a good use of your time.

Pimsleur tapes, on the other hand, can be beneficial because they help you practice pronunciation in the context of conversations. However, they are still quite slow. To test this, I started training with the German Pimsleur tapes two weeks before beginning my German classes. I felt like I was making huge progress by finishing 1/2 of the German 1 tapes—until I had surpassed that knowledge in fewer than two days with an actual teacher.

The 90 Day Plan to Learning a Language

It’s possible to achieve fluency, or at least a high speaking level, in just 90 days, but it requires intense focus. The biggest shift was in mindset: I had to change my self conception from ‘Maneesh: a blogger who wants to learn Italian’ to ‘Maneesh: Italian learner (who blogs in his extra time).

If you don’t have the freedom to focus fulltime on learning a language, that’s okay, but the process will take longer than 90 days. Just make sure that you continue to practice every day, or else you’ll lose your knowledge rapidly.

Days 1-30

The first thirty days are critical to learning a new language. You need to immerse yourself as fully as possible.

I highly recommend moving to a country where the language is spoken if you want to learn a language in 90 days. This will help you get into the language learning mindset, and will allow you to surround yourself with the new language. If you are able to move to a new country, try to live with a host family. You’ll learn a lot by eating meals with a family that hosts you.

In any case, during the first month, work one on one with a private tutor—not group classes. Group classes allow you to sit back and be lazy, while a private tutor forces you to learn.

This is important: you must be an active learner. Most people allow themselves to be taught to, but you have to take an active role in asking questions. The best way to understand this process is via video—part of the video series I made to supplement this post includes a sample of a class I took while studying Swedish, with explanations of the questions I ask during private training. Check out the language learning videos I’ve made for this post here.

You’re going to start encountering a lot of words and phrases that you don’t know, both with your private tutor, and when you practice languages on your own. Enter these words in your memorization software.

You want to start memorizing 30 words and phrases per day. Why 30? Because in 90 days, you’ll have learned 80% of the language.

This great article talks about the number of words in the Russian language.

the 75 most common words make up 40% of occurrences
the 200 most common words make up 50% of occurrences
the 524 most common words make up 60% of occurrences
the 1257 most common words make up 70% of occurrences
the 2925 most common words make up 80% of occurrences
the 7444 most common words make up 90% of occurrences
the 13374 most common words make up 95% of occurrences
the 25508 most common words make up 99% of occurrences

As you can see, you need to learn around 3000 to hit 80% of the words … probably enough before you can start learning words easily by context. At 30 words/day, you’ll have learned almost 3000 in 90 days.

Use mnemonics to help memorize words.

Days 31-60

After your first month, it’s time to focus on exposing yourself to the language as much as possible. After a month of private tutoring, you’ll have the ability to have basic conversations.

If your private tutor is getting expensive, you might consider doing advanced group classes at this point—it’ll save you money and give you access to other friends who are learning the language. Just be careful of speaking only in English. Try to make it a rule to speak in the new language as much as possible. Continue with your private tutor, if possible.

If at all possible, find a boyfriend or girlfriend who is a native speaker. Learning a language is much easier when you’re dating someone who speaks that language. I once met a man who spoke fluent Russian, and when I asked him how long it took to learn, he answered, ‘two wives.’ The best advice I can give you for finding a significant other is something my Italian friend once told me: “Couchsurfing isn’t a dating site … but it helps.”

Now is the time to start finding language partners. Check out the Resources section above and use The Mixxer and Couchsurfing to find people who speak the language you want to learn. Attempt to spend a few hours everyday practicing your language. At this point, because you have a basic grasp of the language, it shouldn’t be a chore—you are basically spending time socializing with new friends.

Try reading simple books in your target language and underlining words that you don’t know. You can add these to your memorization app.

You should start trying to think in the new language. Every time you try to express a thought to yourself, but can’t remember the word, write it down in your memorization software. Continue learning 30 words and phrases per day.

Days 61-90

By day 60, you should be in a good position to speak the language. You just simply need to keep practicing. Have deeper conversations with your language partners. Try to go out with them as much as possible—I’ve even found that a moderate amount of alcohol helps significantly with language practice.

Continue studying 30 words a day and practicing the ones you’ve already learned, and you’ll be approaching the 3000 word mark—enough to speak a language close to fluently.

By now, you can start watching TV and reading books in your target language. Rent some DVDs in the foreign language and try to follow along. If you need to, turn on the subtitles. Don’t worry if you have trouble, because understanding film is a lot more difficult than having a one-on-one conversation.

Keep on working on the language for several hours per day, and by the end of the month, you’ll find that you have a good grasp on the language. It’s pretty amazing what you can do in just 90 days with intense focus.

Conclusion

Congratulations! You’ve done it–you’ve learned a language in just 90 days. The best part is that you’ll find it much faster to learn your next language. You’ve done the hard part–learning how to learn a language.

You’ve unlocked a new skill. Language learning is about building a new habit—the habit of thinking and speaking in a new language. And once you perfect a single language, you’ve laid the foundation for doing even more.

Imagine, the next time you meet a waiter or tourist from Italy or Mexico or Greece, you could start talking, tell a joke, and—if you can remember the punchline in time—get to experience the elation of making someone laugh in their own language.

That, my friends, is zen.

Maneesh Sethi created a set of videos for Zen Habits readers to demonstrate how to learn a language rapidly. Get them at Hack The System, and you’ll also learn how to create systems that help you build habits and achieve your goals, unconventionally and rapidly.

Healthy Food For Healthy Skin…

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June 2, 2012

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You may have your daily skin care routine down with your potions and lotions, but for a healthy glow, beauty starts from the inside out.

Summer sun, tanning beds and fake tanners are no comparison to a diet full of fruits and vegetables. According to research conducted by Dr. David Perrett, those who ate a diet rich in carotenoids saw a noticeable enhancement in skin color, which was perceived as healthier than those who just got a tan affecting melanin pigmentation.

The picture below, from UK Campus demonstrates the visual differences between tan skin (on the left), pale skin, and carotenoid rich skin on the right. Which one do you think looks healthiest?

Skin Color Variation Photo

Nutrients For Skin

To enhance red and yellow tones in the skin eat a diet rich in fruits and vegetables. Dr. Ross Whitehead’s research determined that the two main carotenoids that produced a healthy glow were beta-carotene and lycopene. “Our study suggests that an increase in fruit and veggie consumption of around three portions, sustained over a six-week period, is sufficient to convey perceptible improvements in the apparent healthiness and attractiveness of facial skin.”

So what qualifies as a portion? To avoid confusion and keep meal planning simple, current FDA Guidelines recommend filling half your plate with fruits and vegetables at every meal.

Top Foods For Skin

Vibrant Vegetables

Pic by robertz65 via sxc.hu

While we associate beta-carotene with carrots and lycopene with tomatoes, there is a rainbow of options for enhancing your carotenoids.

For beta-carotene rich fruits and vegetables choose bright oranges and reds. Think carrots, yams, cantaloupe, peaches, apricots, peppers and pumpkin. Or go dark with dark leafy greens like kale, spinach and chard. Beta-carotene is a fat-soluble antioxidant, so include nuts, seeds or a splash of olive-oil with your meal.

Increase lycopene in your diet by reaching for tomatoes, watermelon, grapefruit, hot peppers, parsley, basil, guava and asparagus.

Be sure and include your daily dose of Sibu Revitalize and Renew Liquid Supplement. Sea buckthorn berries are full of beta-carotene and lycopene.

Vibrant fruits and veggies give us vibrant skin. Stock up on your favorite beta-carotene and lycopene rich treats and munch your way to radiance. Bon Appetit!

Where in the World Do I Start…

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Post written by Leo Babauta.

One of the most frequent questions I get when people read Zen Habits, looking to change their lives, is:

“Where do I start?”

From getting in shape to flossing to getting productive to waking earlier to learning languages and much more … there are so many habits to change that people often become confused, overwhelmed, to the point where they don’t start.

I know, because I’ve been there. For me, before I learned how to change habits, the confusion of where to start resulted in two problems: 1) I would often try too many things at once, because I wanted to change a lot of things; or 2) I would just not even try, because it was too hard to figure out.

How did I solve it? I picked one thing, and just started.

This is what I recommend: pick something fun and easy. One thing. Anything, really. What you pick to start with matters little, because you’ll get to everything you want to work on eventually. Where it does matter is in how difficult the change is — if it’s too hard, you might fail and get discouraged and lose confidence. If it’s easy and fun, you’re more likely to succeed and move on to the next challenge.

That said, looking back on things, I have a few suggestions for great habits to start with. I recommend picking one of the following, depending on how much it appeals to you, and how much fun you might have doing it.

1. A Mindfulness Practice. There are a few good options here: 5 minutes of meditation, a mindful tea ritual, or 5 minutes of mindful eating at one meal per day (do nothing but be mindful as you eat, no distractions like reading or TV). Not only are these beautiful, calming practices, they actually set an amazing foundation for future changes. At the most fundamental level, they are practice for being mindful as you do anything, including undergoing other habit changes. One of the best things I’ve ever done is learning to be more mindful.

2. Simplify. Simplifying practices like decluttering or simplifying your schedule are great ways to create space for the important things in your life. I’ve found that a beautiful, uncluttered space is perfect for other things like exercise, reading, meditation, writing, and so on. Decluttering your schedule (find one thing to eliminate or simplify each day) is a great way to create space for other habit changes to follow.

3. Fun Exercise. What? Exercise can be fun? Well, sure — it is for me! I look forward to exercise, whether because running allows me to clear my head, walking allows me to mull over different ideas, or because working out with a friend is a wonderful way to socialize. If exercise doesn’t seem fun to you, you might just need to find the right partner, coach, team, or game to play. Exercise is a great habit to start with because it makes your whole day better, makes your mind more focused, and gives you the confidence to tackle other habits.

4. A Small Heathy Eating Habit. I love this habit because it makes you feel lighter, healthier, and happier. That change can affect everything else you do. A simple eating habit might be to eat fruit and raw nuts for a snack instead of greasy or sweet snacks, or drinking water or tea instead of soda, or eating veggies instead of something fried or starchy for dinner. Enjoy the cleaner, lighter taste, the lack of heaviness, greasiness and bloatedness you feel afterward. You don’t have to revamp your entire diet — just one small eating change is a great way to start.

What if you want to do all four of these? Pick the one you are looking forward to the most. If there’s a tie, then pick randomly. It doesn’t matter where you start. What matters is that you start.

The Tiny Guide to Being a Great Dad…

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Post written by Leo Babauta.

I am blessed with six wonderful children and a fantastic and lovely wife, and for this I am deeply grateful. But on a day like today, a lazy Sunday morning when my family is sleeping in and the soft light of the morning permeates the house, I reflect on what it’s like to be a dad.

Not just a dad … a great dad. This is a height I don’t always reach, but I believe I do inhabit that space sometimes. I’m a great dad, on my best days.

If you’re curious about my thoughts, as a dad of 19 years that has included countless sleepless nights, endless answering of questions, thousands of nursery rhymes sung and horsey rides given, hundreds of thousands of words read in children’s books, more than my share of wiping up spitup, poopie butts and much more … here is my offering to the world.

Don’t worry, it’s a fairly simple guide.

The Three Rules

There are only three things you need to do to be a great dad:

1. Be there. If you’re in their lives, you rock. If you’re there when they scrape their knee, lose their first tooth, need someone to cry to, need help with their school project, want a partner for playing house or hide-and-seek … you are already being a great dad. Be there, when they need you, and when they don’t.

2. Love them. They will know you love them, if you love them fully. It will show in your smile, in your touch, in your good-morning hugs. But also tell them on a regular basis. Infuse all your dad actions with love.

3. Be present. It’s great to be in the same room with them, but as much as you can afford to, be fully present with them. Shut off the mobile device, close the laptop, turn off the TV, and really pay attention. Listen to their long fragmented stories. Really watch when they want to show off their new wizard or ninja move.

That’s it. That’s all you need to be a great dad. Well, there are some bonus moves, but those are just extensions of the above three.

The Bonus Moves

If you want some specifics of how to do the above three rules, here are some ideas:

  1. Sing with them.
  2. Run around with them.
  3. Make believe with them.
  4. Read to them daily.
  5. Dance with them.
  6. Tell them corny jokes.
  7. Paint with them.
  8. Make videos where they are the star.
  9. Set a healthy example by being active and eating well.
  10. Show them how to be independent.
  11. Teach them critical thinking, rather than just obedience.
  12. Teach them how to teach themselves.
  13. Don’t nag.
  14. Don’t be overprotective.
  15. Show them you’re proud of them.
  16. Let them make mistakes.
  17. When they get hurt, use that moment to teach them how to deal with pain.
  18. Show interest in what they’re interested in, and don’t make it seem trivial.
  19. Show them how to work passionately.
  20. Spend some quiet cuddly time with them.
  21. Make them pancakes with faces.
  22. Have Nerf dart gun fights.
  23. Play board games.
  24. Take them on hikes.
  25. Play sports with them.
  26. Show them how to use a knife.
  27. Be honest.
  28. Honor your commitments.
  29. Love your wife, and treat her with respect.
  30. Be compassionate to others, and them.
  31. Be happy with yourself.


Posted: 06.17.2012

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» 20 Small Actions to Create a Fit Environment :zenhabits

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Post written by Leo Babauta.

I’ve learned, in the last seven years of getting fitter each year (from a really bad starting point), that when it comes to getting in shape, your environment is everything.

Small things I’ve done to change my environment make my life set up for getting fitter, slowly, gradually, but surely.

Consider two scenarios:

1. Person A has a long work day, gets home, wants to just veg out on the couch watching TV to relax. Is hungry so goes to the kitchen and gets some convenience food (he’s too tired to cook), gets some unhealthy snacks that are in the cupboard. Orders pizza later because it’s easy and there’s nothing else ready to eat besides some microwaveable stuff. After gorging on junk food, he’s too tired to do anything else but watch TV. Goes to sleep, gets up, rushes off to work, where there’s junk food all around anytime he gets hungry. Everyone else is in bad shape so he doesn’t find any motivation to work out. This cycle keeps repeating.

2. Person B has a workout time blocked into his workday, and has a workout partner waiting for him each day, so he won’t fail to do the workout. All his friends are relatively fit and often participate in various fitness challenges together. When they socialize, it often revolves around healthier foods. At home, he has no junk food, no convenience food, no snacks. No microwave. He has lots of healthy foods, and cooks them in big batches so that when he’s hungry and tired, the food just needs to be warmed on the stove. He participates in online social networks that revolve around fitness. He has no TV.

Which person is more likely to get fit? The person who has his life set up so that he’ll be likely to do the things to get fit.

The kicker, as you probably guessed, is that I am both Person A and Person B. Well, I was Person A and got overweight and unhealthy. Then I changed to Person B and got much healthier and fitter.

It was all a matter of creating the right environment. I’m happy to tell you that the changes aren’t that hard to make, and can be done over time.

Small Actions

The following are some ideas you can use to set up an environment conducive to getting fit — I’ve used them all at various times:

  1. Get rid of the snacks. Don’t keep them in your house or you’ll be more likely to eat them.
  2. Don’t buy convenience food. You’re likely to eat this when you’re too tired to cook.
  3. Instead, cook big batches of healthy food once a week. Have it in the fridge, ready to be heated up.
  4. Take healthy snacks to work.
  5. Create a healthy eating challenge with your coworkers.
  6. Join Fitocracy (invite code: zenhabits) and make friends there. Log your activities.
  7. Join a running club.
  8. Find a workout partner.
  9. Set up an appointment with your best friend to go walking or running every day.
  10. Get a coach.
  11. Set fitness challenges with your friends. Log them online, on Facebook or some other social site.
  12. Have a chinup bar in your doorway, and do a chinup every time you walk by.
  13. Join a sports team.
  14. Have nuts and fruit with you when you’re on the go.
  15. Make it hard to turn on the TV (put it in the closet or something).
  16. Use a program like LeechBlock or Freedom to shut the Internet down at a certain time each day.
  17. Have healthy potlucks with friends or family.
  18. Publicly commit to posting body pics or measurements each week on your blog.
  19. Make a list of healthy restaurants, or healthy meals at other restaurants, for when you feel like eating out.
  20. Park farther away from things so you’ll walk more.

Obviously not all of these will apply to everyone, and they’re just a start of what can be done, to give you an idea.

Setting up a fit environment doesn’t have to be hard, nor does it have to be overnight. But I challenge you to do one of these actions today, and see what happens when you start creating the right setup for a healthy life.

Unprocrastination Course

Today is the last day to join the Sea Change Program and be a part of the Unprocrastination Course in July. Don’t put it off! Read more.