Change Academy

People seem to love these short-term challenges where you give up sugar for a week, do 25 push-ups every day for a month, or give up alcohol for SoberOctober. While these can be fun, and an interesting challenge, do they ever actually result in permanent change? In this episode, we will give you a recipe to make the most of them.

Show Notes

People seem to love these short-term challenges where you give up sugar for a week, do 25 push-ups every day for a month, or give up alcohol for SoberOctober. While these can be fun, and an interesting challenge, do they ever actually result in permanent change? In this episode, we will give you a recipe to make the most of them.

Resources mentioned: The 30-Day Nutrition Upgrade

Key Takeaways: 
  • Habits aren’t made or broken because we did something (or avoided doing something) through willpower alone, for a set amount of time.
  • Doing short term challenges can actually delay the process of making more meaningful changes.
  • If you want to use a short-term challenge as a springboard for longer-term change, make sure you’re not just counting down the days, but using that time to gain a better understanding of the role that a particular behaviour plays in your life.
  • Be sure to think past the end of the challenge: what happens at the end? What do you want to carry forward into the future?
Lab Experiment:
When you find yourself considering joining in the latest 7 day, 21 day, or month-long fad, take some time to ask yourself some questions:
  1. Why is this attractive to me? 
  2. What do I hope to learn from this temporary challenge?
  3. What plan can I put in place to ensure I don’t just return to my previous behaviour as soon as it is done? 
  4. Am I using this as a delay or distraction from the deeper changes that I know I want to make? (see episode 6: the hidden cost of unmet goals)
Thinking carefully about these questions before you embark on a short-term challenge can make it about more just a temporary exercise in willpower.

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Creators & Guests

Host
Monica Reinagel
Monica Reinagel has been helping people create healthier lives for more than 15 years through her Nutrition Diva podcast, books, online coaching programs and in-person workshops. As a licensed and board-certified nutritionist, her approach is grounded in science but is also practical and realistic. Monica is also a former professional opera singer.
Editor
Brock Armstrong
Brock has been working in audio since the 1980s (the late 1980s to be sure) and has focussed his expertise on podcasting since 2007.

What is Change Academy?

Learn how to cultivate a more productive mindset, form sustainable habits, and create a lifestyle that supports both your goals and your wellbeing with host, Monica Reinagel. Drawing on decades of expertise and experience, Monica provides guidance on navigating the challenging process of behavior change in a fun and accessible way. Learn more and find show notes for every episode at https://changeacademypodcast.com