Joy and Full: Healthier with Sarah Wells, MD

Many of us struggle with quitting new healthy habit changes because they seem too hard. Too overwhelming. Too taxing for our energy or time. Or just too uncomfortable.  But what if we lowered our standards for what we "count" as achieving the healthy habit? You may think this would mean you won't reach your long term health goals. But if "lowering the threshold" of what yo...

Another helpful thing to use which can help us in staying consistent in healthy habits is tracking them! Having a visible scoreboard of our decisions benefits us in a lot of ways. We can celebrate success even when we don't see it in results. We can decrease the need for perfectionistic thinking. Tracking helps us NOT FORGET what are the actual habits we are trying to currently build. And tra...

When we can "swallow our frog" and do the hard thing we've been avoiding, we often found the task we've put off isn't all that hard after all.  Not only that, but we can then begin to enjoy the benefits of having completed it for even longer!  So deciding regularly to call out our own procrastination in putting the time or energy in to our health goals is key to cultivatin...

So we've talked about motivation and how to harness it to be consistent in making healthy decisions.  But what are we supposed to do when we feel completely UNmotivated? How do we stay consistent then? We can make decisions WHILE we are motivated that do support us later when the motivation wanes. We can set up our environment, our systems, and tap into other people to help ups stay the cours...

We've been talking about things that support us across the days and weeks in being consistent in practicing healthy habits. Today's episode covers motivation. First, we can schedule the time to peel back the layers and uncover all the reasons that we are motivated to change and improve. We can collect those and write them down, and then use those to drive our consistency every day!

Let's face it. We know it's what we do every day, day after day, across the years and decades that will make the real difference in our health.  So why is it so hard to be consistent? Why do we so often fall into an all-or-nothing mentality and then crash and burn with our goals and habit change attempts? Today I open up a series of episodes that will be focused around these questions an...

What if you were playing a sport and aiming for the wrong goal? Not only would it be pretty embarrassing, but it would also not win you any points. And even if you did all the right drills in practice all week, and your agility and speed and skill was refined…if you are aiming for the wrong goal—-you’d hurt your team!  SO how do you know if you are accidentally aiming in your mind for the WRONG GO...

Today is the final episode in a 3-part series about weight regain, where I discussed the common causes of weight regain. I then detailed what worked to help me keep 90 pounds off for 4 years, as well as what happened to cause me to deal with some regain this past year.  Finally in this 3rd episode of the series, I'll talk about what I'm doing now to lose that extra regained weight. Hopef...

Today is the second in a 3-part series about weight regain, where I discuss the common causes of weight regain. I then detail what worked to help me keep 90 pounds off for 4 years, as well as what happened to cause me to deal with some regain this past year.  Finally in the 3rd episode of the series, I'll talk about what I'm doing now to lose that extra regained weight. Hopefully this wi...

Weight regain is so very common after weight loss. But why? What is driving it? Why can't we just lose weight and keep it off?  Today is the first in a 3-part series about weight regain, where I'll discuss the common causes of weight regain. I'll then discuss what worked to help me keep 90 extra pounds off for 4 years, as well as what happened to cause me to deal with some regain th...

Maybe you've seen these machines in your local gym or in a Physical Therapy clinic: You look over and see someone standing on a small platform that is shaking them all over! What are they, what do they do, and why would anyone use them? Today's episode covers an overview of some of the reasons people may try them, and I'll discuss the data I found as I searched to understand if they...

I todays episode I discuss a study from Frontiers in Psychology about the mindsets surrounding healthy behaviors, and this week focus on finding surrounding our mindset around healthy food. How can we think differently about the food we know is healthy, to get to a place where we also actually desire it?

If you took 10 minutes to adjust the way you thought about exercise, and it meant that in 7 weeks, not only would you have exercised more already, but you'd be signing up to KEEP exercising...what would that do for you? I todays episode I discuss a study from Frontiers in Psychology about the mindsets surrounding healthy behaviors, and specifically: exercise. People studied who made some adju...

Its about that time of January again where many 'throw in the towel', so to speak, in reagards to their health goals for the New Year. We might get distracted with all the other things on our plates, or run out of motivation to continue.  But for many of us, perfectionism is rearing it's head! We can get tricked into thinking that if we can't do it perfectly, why even bother? ...

We are in the season of the year where there are lots of bright, shiny, fancy plans available to offer you a healthier year. Some of them are great, others not so much. Some of them will only leave your wallet lighter! So what are actually the changes that need to be made to get the biggest bang for your buck (or for your time and effort?). Which 'hacks' are a waste of your time and ener...

So many of our plans when we set out to make changes in health, wether it be at the New Year or at other time, seem to have a lot to do with what we determine to cut out, or to cut back! Maybe its sugar, or desserts, or carbs, or chips, or diet soda, there is usually a temptation to focus on what we WON'T be doing or eating. But approaching the changes we want to have by shifting our focus to...

Key to success for me has been having a written plan. It starts with creating a planned time on the calendar TO plan. Then starting with the big picture of a year of goals and goal-setting, then breaking that up in to quarterly and monthly goals and plans. From there, it works best to break it down further to weekly plans (I'll talk about my favorite weekly calendar format). Then dialing in t...

This week I'm sharing my 3 top goal-setting strategies that WORKED for me in 2022, which I'm planning on utilizing to drive success for myself in 2023. 

What motivations can drive Christians in making decisions that benefit their health? Where does gluttony come in? How do we glorify God in our eating? Is it wrong to turn to food for comfort? And what are we missing out on when we do? 

Here I'll give you 12 tips--things that have worked for me--in enjoying healthier Christmas seasons.

Let's take an approach to Christmas feasting where we get to strategically enter in to celebrations while learning to exercise restraint. Let's find ways to extract the wonderful feeling of the season in new ways that we haven’t been able to appreciate before, because we were SO focused on the food and the struggle of food decisions. I'll talk about tactical physical/food strategies...

What if you turned your hardest hour of the day, in terms of eating, into your most powerful hour? An hour where not only did you not overeat, but instead you flourished and fulfilled all the demands on your life within that hour with an overflow of joy. What would happen? How would your life change if you did this on a daily basis?  Today we are going to talk about and break down what is happenin...

I am so excited to talk about one of the KEY habits that has driven my personal success in weight loss and maintenance that has to do with this time of year. And it is gratitude! Practicing it regularly, and getting better at it has driven my success in actually enjoying healthy habits SO MUCH. If you want to work on your health and increase success in enjoying healthier habits, you’ve GOT to appr...

Perhaps you've heard that Obesity is associated with an increased risk for a number of different cancers. Why is this? What is behind the connection, and what can be done about it? Does this mean that if you can't seem to lose the extra weight you are doomed to bear all this risk, or are there specific steps you can take to mitigate your risk even if the weight loss seems to stall? Under...

Let's do a but of a dive into the topic of insulin resistance: What is it? What is happening in the body when someone developes it? Why is is dangerous? How do I know if I have it? What can be done about it?