Why Better Health is NOT your Priority
Very often, I speak to someone who tells me that their key priority is to get healthy.
But is it?
If you think about what you prioritise in life, it usually revolves around work (career), family and your social life. Better health is a desire that comes from how positively or negatively these three aforementioned factors affect your health.
When I work with a client, I ask them what their top 3 priorities are from our nutrition sessions together. The responses are typically to lose body fat, gain energy and eat better. These are great, but they are not actually priorities because they are simply not a strong enough reason to put the work in…unless they are attached to a bigger end goal (which is typically the real priority).
What the client is really trying to say is usually in one of the examples below:
“I want to feel more confident, so that I can perform better in my role”
“I want to earn more money but don’t feel strong enough”
“I want a promotion at work, but don’t feel physically ready to go for it”
“I need to be a healthy parent for my young children”
“I want to look and feel my best at my closest friend’s/relative’s wedding/birthday/event etc”
“I want to compete in the triathlon later this year”
For the working professionals, it’s important to know that health impacts your career. Career-driven individuals are faced with many challenges that can quickly become obstacles to achieving and maintaining a healthy lifestyle, because they are constantly pushing themselves, working long hours, working towards deadlines, traveling, entertaining clients etc. This usually results in burnout and chronic stress.
Focusing on your career might bring you financial success, but it most likely isn’t doing the same for your health. Not investing in your health quickly results in a domino effect of health problems. Employee wellness is now a hot topic, according to the CDC: from 1999 –2000 through 2017 –March 2020, US obesity prevalence increased from 30.5% to 41.9%. During the same time, the prevalence of severe obesity increased from 4.7% to 9.2%. The estimated annual medical cost of obesity in the United States was nearly $173 billion in 2019 dollars. Medical costs for adults who had obesity were $1,861 higher than medical costs for people with healthy weight. An unhealthy lifestyle can result in lost time at work, less quality recreational time outside of work, and a shorter lifespan. If you aren’t keeping yourself educated about your nutrition needs you could be suffering from nutrient deficiencies (especially potassium, fiber, calcium, Vitamin D), chronic disease, and extra pounds.
However, there are also many busy professionals, who have figured out how to manage a successful career along with a healthy lifestyle.
Having an understanding of where you can start making changes towards bettering your overall health, may quickly start affecting the quality of your work and your life. Being fit and health provides you with energy to power through the busy work day, and keeps you alert so that you can operate at your best. Knowing what to eat and when to eat it, so that you can fuel your body throughout the work day means you also don’t need to cave to 3pm sugar hits.
Following are 3 starting points for you, so that your health doesn’t quickly fall by the wayside, resulting in unhealthy weight gain and serious chronic disease.
List your 3 key life priorities today.
Decide how your nutrition and fitness is impacted, or impacts, these priorities.
Make small, sustainable changes to your nutrition and fitness so that you can start to see the positive effect of these changes in your life priorities.
It sounds simple, but for many this can be a little more complicated and overwhelming. If you need further support then seeing a specialist is a smart investment of your time and money.
I work with high achievers and busy professionals to make nutrition easy and sustainable. This is personalised nutrition that enables you to stay focused, become more agile and feel stronger physically and mentally. My clients are high achievers with big life goals, however their time is limited.
Nutrition is 80% of your success and a key element to their success in achieving their desired health goals.
Many people reach a point where family and career take precedence and health is put on the backburner. My genius is working with people to bring their health back to the forefront by tailoring nutrition to work for you to meet your health and fitness goal.
You can also follow my work on @ExecFuel on FB and IG, and you can also read recent reviews here.
