informative essay: "how to live a healthy life."

PART 3

Living a Healthy Life

C o p y r i g h t 2 0 1 9 . N e w H a r b i n g e r P u b l i c a t i o n s .

A l l r i g h t s r e s e r v e d . M a y n o t b e r e p r o d u c e d i n a n y f o r m w i t h o u t p e r m i s s i o n f r o m t h e p u b l i s h e r , e x c e p t f a i r u s e s p e r m i t t e d u n d e r U . S . o r a p p l i c a b l e c o p y r i g h t l a w .

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CHAPTER 7

Get Yourself out of Solitary Confinement

In the United States, what do we do with the worst, most difficult prisoners? We put them in solitary confinement. It’s hardly surpris- ing that solitary confinement is a form of punishment, since evolu- tionarily we are hardwired to seek connection with other humans. Let’s explore the reasons why this is the case.

A foal typically stands within thirty minutes of being born, and within a few hours it can run with the herd. Human babies, however, are incredibly reliant on caregivers for survival. The first three months after birth are often referred to as the “fourth trimester,” meaning that babies really should still be in the womb. The reason they don’t stay there longer is that at around forty weeks (nine months) the human skull is still small enough to pass through the birth canal. If we spend any more time in the womb, our mothers wouldn’t be able to give birth to us. So being born “too soon” has been a necessary trade-off in human evolution: we get to have a large, adaptive brain, but we’re born before we can survive on our own. As a result, humans take care of their young for longer than

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almost any other mammal (Tirch, Schoendorff, and Silberstein 2014).

Evolution needed a way to motivate caregivers to take care of these rather helpless newborns, and it came in the form of attach- ment (Cozolino 2010; Mikulincer and Shaver 2007b; Siegel 2012), which is the bond that develops between a baby and a caregiver (Bowlby 1969, 1973; Mikulincer and Shaver 2007a). Attachment is the reason we feel soothed and calm in the presence of safe and caring loved ones and distressed when we’re separated from them (Porges 2007). These feelings go both ways for infants and caregiv- ers. In fact, the sound of a crying baby motivates parents to care for infants, so much so that listening to a crying baby is sometimes used as a form of torture. Attachment also explains why solitary confine- ment (being separated from other humans) is a form of punishment. The effects of attachment don’t end with the baby-parent relation- ship, as we carry these forward into our relationships with spouses and other important people in our life.

Western culture is fixated on the notions of individualism and independence. We receive messages that we need to “love ourselves” and to be able to “be on our own,” and that it’s dysfunctional to be dependent on others. The problem with these notions is that we’re hardwired to function better when we have close, safe, and secure relationships with others. When we feel securely connected to others, we’re better able to explore the world, handle challenges, and be resilient (Bowlby 1969, 1973; Mikulincer and Shaver 2007b). In fact, the Western world is in the minority with its focus on individu- alism. Most of the world focuses on collectivism, which prioritizes group cohesiveness and interdependence. Collectivistic cultures assume that close relationships are necessary for well-being.

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Personally, I hate to be alone. I’m an extrovert, and I feel uneasy when I’m by myself for long periods of time. I used to think this made me weak or dysfunctional, and that I needed to learn to be more independent. But now that I understand human evolution better, I realize that my anxiousness about being alone is hardwired! It’s not dysfunctional. That said, there clearly is a balance. It may not be healthy to be around people who are unsupportive or unkind just to avoid being alone.

So why am I talking about relationships in a book about health behaviors? Studies show that close relationships make us healthier. People’s wounds heal faster if they have secure, close relationships, and they recover from illness faster, have a longer life, and are men- tally healthier (for example, Holt-Lunstad, Smith, and Layton 2010). When we’re younger, having more people in our social network pre- dicts better health, but as we mature the quality of relationships rather than the quantity matters more (Carmichael, Reis, and Duberstein 2015). So if you’re reading this thinking I don’t have many good friends, don’t worry; having just one close relationship is enough for you to gain these health benefits. There’s also evidence that how healthy your friends are predicts how healthy you are. For example, studies have shown that if your social network includes a lot of people living with obesity, there is a greater chance that you’ll also be living with obesity (Christakis and Fowler 2007). There are mul- tiple different reasons why the healthy habits of our family and friends might influence ours, including genetics, such as the propen- sity to put on weight or a preference for sugary foods; living in similar environments, such as those with access to parks and walking paths; and shared social norms, such as having social events that revolve around food (Hruschka et al. 2011; Bartle 2012). Thus, having a

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social network that focuses on healthy habits can be key to keeping your own healthy habits going.

No human is an island—at least the healthy ones aren’t. Just as you don’t live alone in a vacuum, your healthy habits don’t happen in a vacuum either. People in your life can be both allies and foes (usually unintentionally) when it comes to how you live, so your social network plays a big role in your ability to engage in healthy habits and to live a healthy and vibrant life. In this chapter we’re going to explore our close relationships and how to have your social environment support your healthy habits.

What to Do with Other People… When I worked at the obesity clinic, I regularly heard stories from participants about how they worked hard to keep snacks like potato chips or chocolate out of their home only to have a spouse or chil- dren or a parent bring them back in. “How can I possibly be healthy when my husband keeps bringing potato chips into the house!? I’ve asked him a hundred times to stop, and he still does it.” Dealing with other people is not a simple task. I could probably write a whole book on this topic alone. Here are a few ways you can deal with other people in your life (Harris 2009), each of which I’ll go over in more detail:

• Change the things you can change.

• Accept the things you cannot change.

• Do nothing.

• Leave.

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Change the Things You Can Change

If others in your social network are not supporting your healthy habits, the first step is to ask directly for their support. Assertiveness is a skill you can use to better communicate your needs and increase the likelihood that others in your life will support your healthy habits. There are lots of ways to define assertiveness. I have found it easiest to describe assertiveness (and the alternative ways to com- municate) in political terms:

• Assertive communication is like a democracy: You get to have your vote, but your candidate doesn’t always win. In other words, you get to state your needs but you don’t always get your way.

• Aggressive communication is like a dictatorship: you say what you need and always get your way.

• Passive communication means you don’t even vote (or state a need), which often results in your needs not being met.

• Passive-aggressive communication means you don’t state your needs clearly but make sure you get your way. You don’t vote (you don’t state a need), but you still make sure you get the outcome you want. This communica- tion style is like using espionage to throw a coup and put your own dictator in power.

Assertive communication involves clearly and directly expressing your feelings, opinions, and needs while respecting the feelings and rights of others. It’s about you stating your needs, not about whether they get met or not. How you behave is within your control; how the

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other person responds is outside of your control. The only way you’ll find out if people in your life can meet your needs is if you ask specifi- cally for what you need. For example, there’s a difference between saying, “I need to focus on my healthy habits, so I can’t go to Ribfest with you,” versus “I can’t believe you’re asking me to go to Ribfest!”

It’s good to keep in mind that what you’re asking of others may involve a difficult healthy habit for them too. When practicing asser- tive communication, it can help to apply all the things you’ve learned about changing healthy habits so far. For example, ask for a “do instead” goal rather than a “don’t do” goal (“I’m trying to eat health- ier these days. Can we go to a place that has a salad bar instead of a place that only serves fried food?”). Or perhaps you can use the 90 percent rule: “At least once this week can we eat at home instead of having fast food?”

What gets in the way. Changing your interpersonal style (the ways you relate to others) to be more assertive is a big task, because inter- personal styles are learned from a young age and for very important reasons. Because children can’t choose their family or their environ- ment, they have to adapt. Perhaps as a child you learned to put on a smile even when you were upset, or you were a people pleaser or learned that yelling was the only way to be heard. We all learned such adaptation strategies, and we can be grateful to our mind for figuring out ways for us to survive our childhood environments, some of which were probably pretty difficult.

But as adults we have more choice. We usually get to choose our partners, our friends, and our careers, so this method for survival may no longer be adaptive. It may not help you be healthier or live a life that matters to you. Unfortunately, once the mind finds a

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survival strategy that works, it wants to keep using it no matter what. So changing your interpersonal style probably goes against a well-learned and well-practiced survival strategy. Your passengers may yell at you, and you may need to drive over many rumble strips and feel all kinds of discomfort.

The good news is that you now have all kinds of skills to handle these passengers. (Just review the last few chapters!) Remember, if you find communicating more assertively to be difficult, please start by being compassionate with yourself. When you consider every- thing you know about yourself, your personality, your temperament, your family, and your childhood, your communication style probably makes complete sense. Remind yourself that you didn’t choose how your mind adapted to past circumstances, and you didn’t choose your parents or your childhood (Tirch, Silberstein, and Kolts 2018). It’s not your fault you’re struggling to change your communication style, but it is your responsibility, because no one else but you can choose to change.

Accept the Things You Cannot Change

Remember, being assertive means that you state your needs, not that your needs get met all the time. If your needs are getting met all the time, you’re actually being aggressive, not assertive. There will be people in your life who, no matter how assertive you are, are not able to meet your needs. Many (but not all) of us experience this dynamic with the family we were born with. If you’ve struggled with your parents or siblings, assertiveness may do little to change the dynamics of these relationships.

Typically, if somebody is going to be able to meet your need, they will do so on your first or second request. If you’re on your 147th

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request, it’s unlikely this person will be able to meet your need. Now if you’re a well-functioning human, your problem-solving mind is going to go to work on changing this person. Why is he behaving this way? What do I need to say to get her to stop? Maybe if I say it at the right time… Maybe if I say it with the right words… Maybe if I explain it again so she gets it… Here’s the thing: we can’t control other people, but your mind will still do its problem-solving thing and try to figure out how to “solve” the other person’s behavior, but this strategy does not work. We can’t “fix” or “solve” other people.

So then what? The best strategy is to accept that your need will not be met by this person, whom you can’t control. Again, “accept” doesn’t mean giving in or giving up. It doesn’t mean liking or enjoy- ing it. Accepting means taking what is given, moving from “How do I get this person to change” to “Given that this person is not going to change, what do I want to do?” Thus, rather than figuring out how to get your partner to stop bringing potato chips into the house, you move to, Given that my partner won’t stop bringing potato chips into the house, how am I going to deal with it? You may notice that at this point your mind very helpfully suggests some other problem-solving fix to get your partner to change. Just thank your mind and redirect the problem-solving energy toward things you can control, such as your behavior. For example, if potato chips in the house is a problem, be sure to have a bag of kale chips in the house to snack on when the urge to eat the potato chips arises. And honor your own feelings of being disappointed that this person in your life cannot meet your needs: this means acknowledging and taking care of your feelings even if other people are not considering your feelings. (Remember checking in on your puppy—that is, your feelings?)

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How to cope. Problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping are the two main forms of coping we engage in (Carver, Scheier, Weintraub 1989). Problem-focused coping is often effective when the stressor or problem can be fixed or eliminated, and many of us use it in our day-to-day lives. For example, when you have a deadline at work you focus harder on the tasks at hand to complete the project on time, and the problem is fixed. Emotion-focused coping is often effective when the stressor or problem can’t be fixed or eliminated. It involves managing the feelings that arise from the stressor rather than getting rid of the stressor itself. This form of coping is more effective when we need to deal with people who cannot meet our needs.

One emotion-focused coping strategy is to “refuel.” A refueling activity is one that makes you feel more energetic once you’ve done it. Sometimes we do things that we think are relaxing (for example, watching TV) but are actually just a form of zoning out. These activities can actually make us feel more tired. Here are some common refueling activities:

• Spending time with friends and family

• Playing sports

• Meditation

• Going to church

• Getting a massage

• Doing yoga

• Listening to music

• Taking a hot shower

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• Walking the dog

• Doing a hobby or crafts

Different things refuel different people, so you get to choose activities that match your preferences and values. If you’re not sure what does or will work, try some out and notice what shows up. Do you feel energized after playing a board game with your kid, going for a hike, or having coffee with a friend? If so, then these are refueling activities for you. And, as always, notice how your passengers may try to dissuade you from engaging in refueling activities. If a passen- ger says, “You don’t have time for that,” thank her and do it anyway!

Do Nothing

Sometimes we do nothing because our passengers are in charge of our bus and they have convinced us that it doesn’t matter what we do. We can’t change things, so why bother. But sometimes we do nothing because we decide that some other value is more important than changing the situation we’re in.

For example, I worked with a nurse who felt the hospital unit she worked in was unhealthy and toxic. She felt stressed all the time and never had time to take care of herself. Yet she decided to stay because the position gave her health care benefits, and she had a sick child to care for. It is okay to make a decision like this if it is truly consistent with your values. She and I worked on redirecting the energy she put into changing her workplace toward the things that mattered to her, such as being with her sick child, and toward the things she had control over. For example, we made sure she was engaging in refuel- ing activities, because the stressors in her workplace were going to

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remain and would likely deplete her energy. If, like this nurse, you decide to do nothing about a relationship or situation, I encourage you to review the section “Accept the Things You Cannot Change” so you can “do nothing” in the most effective way.

There may also be relationships you can’t leave. You will always be a daughter or son. One of my clients, Katie, had a very difficult relationship with her father, and spending time with him sapped her energy and resulted in her not taking care of herself. She chose to accept that she wasn’t going to have the kind of relationship she really wanted with her father, and to limit her contact with him. We spent a lot of time honoring her feelings of sadness and disappoint- ment. That is, we worked on getting in touch with her feelings and taking care of them. Another client, Marie, couldn’t stop her parents from visiting despite the negative effect it had on her healthy habits. Her parents always brought cake when they visited, and she always ended up eating it to cope with her mother’s criticism. We developed ways that she could control her contact with them, rather than having it be the way they wanted it. She decided to visit them on a regular schedule (Sundays for two hours after church), and between this scheduled time she limited her contact with her parents, remind- ing them that she would see them on Sunday.

Leave

Sometimes lifestyle change means leaving a toxic workplace or ending an unsupportive relationship. If others in your life can’t meet your needs, you may need to develop new relationships with people who can meet your needs. If you decide that you need to leave an unhelpful situation or relationship, your passengers will try to stop

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you (remember, the devil you do know is better than the devil you don’t know), so be prepared for rumble strips ahead! Be ready for your passengers by answering these questions well in advance of any change you make: What value will I be expressing by leaving this relationship or environment? How will leaving this situation help me be the person I want to be? How will I manage the passengers and the discomfort that will arise in order to move toward this value?

Is There Someone in Your Boat? There will be many things in life that you can’t solve. People in your life may not behave the way you want them to, your body may not do what you want it to do, and life circumstances will keep getting in the way of your heathy habits. Close, secure relationships can really help you cope with these realities.

Let’s do another thought experiment. Imagine you’re in a little rowboat out on the ocean, and the boat is taking on water. Other people are worried about the boat sinking, and they attempt to help you in different ways. Some people stand on the shore and shout instructions: “Maybe if you bailed faster,” or “Try bailing with both hands.” These folks are trying to “fix” your problem. Here’s a real- world example. Let’s say you’ve been struggling to quit smoking, and a friend says, “Have you tried that gum? I heard it works. Did you try hypnosis? Maybe that will work.” Your friend is probably saying this with the best intentions, but if the problem could be fixed that easily you would have fixed it already. It’s likely that your problem has no fix or involves a messy, complicated fix, such as needing to manage your passengers more effectively.

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Sometimes people paddle out in a boat and get beside you, saying things like “I know how bad that must be, I’ve been in a sinking boat too.” In the real world, it might look something like this: You’re describing to a friend your lifelong struggle with weight, and she responds, “Oh, I know. It took me over a year to lose my baby weight with the last baby, but just keep working at it.” She’s trying to be helpful, trying to make you feel better, but hearing about another’s personal experience sometimes feels like it takes away from our experience.

Then there are people who get in the boat with you. These people don’t help you bail; they don’t try to fix the problem. What they do is help you feel less alone. Your problem doesn’t go away, but the pain you feel is more bearable when you’re not alone.

Getting in the boat involves validating someone’s experience, which is not the same as validating that the other person’s beliefs are correct. Saying, “I can understand why your weight bothers you” is not the same as saying “You’re right; you’re overweight and your life is terrible.” We often try to talk someone down (make them feel better) by telling them something’s not that bad, but this often results in them upping the ante—that is, they describe something that’s even worse.

Here’s an example:

Anna: I hate this medication for my diabetes. I wish I didn’t have to take it.

Jane: Oh, I’m sure it’s not that bad. Just stick with it.

Anna: No, you clearly don’t understand. It’s really bad. It makes me tired and nauseous and I don’t think it’s even helping.

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Jane: Well, I’m sure the doctors wouldn’t give it to you if it wasn’t helpful.

Anna: Well, they don’t have to deal with the side effects, do they? I don’t even know if I’ll keep taking this medication.

Here’s what it would sound like if the other person’s feelings and experiences (not necessarily their beliefs) are validated:

Anna: I hate this medication for my diabetes. I wish I didn’t have to take it.

Jane: What’s the worst part about it?

Anna: It makes me tired and nauseous and I don’t think it’s even helping.

Jane: I can understand why you don’t like it. It must be hard to keep taking it.

Anna: Yeah, but I need to take it. Otherwise my diabetes will be out of control.

Ironically, by validating others rather than trying to convince them something’s not that bad, we’re more likely to actually make them feel better. This is what it means to get in the boat with someone; you validate your friend’s experience so she knows she’s not alone in whatever she’s feeling. Notice that this doesn’t involve having to validate that someone’s beliefs are correct (for example, Jane didn’t have to say, “You’re right, the medication isn’t working”), just the person’s feelings (for example, “I can understand why you don’t like it”).

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Research has shown the importance of having others in our boat with us. In one study, researchers had participants stand at the bottom of a hill and estimate how tall it was (Schnall et al. 2008). If participants stood with a loved one, they estimated the hill to be less high than when they were alone. In another study, participants esti- mated the weight of a backpack that they’d have to carry. If they were with a loved one—knowing full well that the other person would not help them carry the backpack—they estimated that the backpack was lighter than when they were alone. As you can see, when we have the support of others, the hills we have to climb in life seem smaller, and the weights we have to carry seem lighter.

In a series of amazing studies (Johnson et al. 2013; Coan, Schaefer, and Davidson 2006), researchers looked at the impact that having others in our boat had on our experience of pain. These researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure brain activity in participants whose toes were shocked. The fMRI allowed researchers to observe the experience of pain based on the brain’s response. When participants held the hand of a loved one, their brain showed less pain, whereas when they were alone it showed more (the shock administered was always the same). When they were shocked alone, participants described the shock as “excruciating,” but when they held the hand of a loved one they described it as “not a big deal.”

It’s important to note that these researchers (Johnson et al. 2013) also found that distressed relationships can make dealing with life’s hurdles even more difficult—that is, “holding the hand” of this person can actually make the pain feel worse. You’re better off alone than seeking support from this person in times of need. We only benefit from having someone else there if we’re in a secure, stable relationship with that person.

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So all of this is to say that when we have supportive, stable, loving relationships, the obstacles don’t seem as big, the burdens don’t seem as heavy, and the pain isn’t as bad. Having someone in your boat doesn’t take the pain away, but it adds comfort, which makes pain and difficulties more bearable. You will face many unsolvable problems in life and with your health; it’s to your benefit to not do so alone.

Choice Point Having read this chapter, you can add some more information to the choice point worksheet. Under “skills” you can write “assertive com- munication,” which can help you with your healthy habits. Under “passengers that get in the way” you can write down some of your maladaptive interpersonal styles, such as pleasing people or passive- ness, which can get in the way of your healthy habits. For example, I often need to be assertive and ask for my needs to be met in order to get to the gym, because I often need the help of others, whether that’s getting someone else to watch my kid or telling my kid that I’m going to miss his sports practice. My passengers will say things like “Don’t be difficult,” or “Don’t bother others with requests,” or “Your son will be upset.” But I need to go to the gym anyway, despite the discomfort I might feel. It helps to remind myself of the rumble strip I have to go over in order to be assertive.

Remember, the part that you control is you. This means that your job is to ask assertively, and to try to get in the boat with your loved ones. These behaviors increase the likelihood that you’ll receive the same treatment from others in your life, even though you don’t control them.

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CHAPTER 8

You Will Fall off the Wagon

Maintaining a healthy habit is very challenging. Life is going to get in your way. Maybe you get sick or your kid gets sick and you stop going to the gym, or you end up at a holiday party face-to-face with your favorite treats and end up eating way too much. It’s not a ques- tion of if you will fall off the wagon—that is, stop engaging in your healthy habits—it’s a question of how quickly can you get back on. You will fall off the wagon, because you’re only human, but do you get back on the next morning, next Monday, or a year from now?

Most people engage in some all-or-nothing thinking when they fall off the wagon: Well, I blew it, I might as well just eat whatever I want. With this kind of thinking, small lapses can turn into long relapses, during which we can undo a lot of the positive effects of our efforts, so it’s key to get back to your healthy habit as quickly as pos- sible. In this chapter we’re going to look at how long it takes to estab- lish healthy habits, what you can do when you fall off the wagon, and, of course, the passengers who might get in the way of sticking to them.

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The “Twenty-One Days to Build a Habit” Myth Perhaps you’ve heard that it takes twenty-one days to build a habit. Unfortunately there is no scientific evidence to back this up (Clear 2014). It actually takes more like two to three years to build a healthy habit. Yes, this probably is discouraging to hear, but I share it in the hopes that you’ll be more compassionate with yourself if you try a health behavior for twenty-one days and it doesn’t stick. You’re not a failure, it just takes longer than this to establish a habit.

It takes at least one calendar year of persistence and consistency for you to figure out how to keep a habit going. After a year you’ve been tested by typical events, such as Thanksgiving and Christmas and the like. The second year through you’re a bit wiser; you’re a bit better at sticking with your habit. But sometimes it takes until the third year for you to notice the absence of your healthy habit, and this will somehow feel odd and remind you to reengage in it. Healthy habits don’t ever become automatic, but they can become part of your routine so that you notice your effort less often. It’s helpful to remind yourself of these facts when you struggle to maintain healthy habits or fall off the wagon altogether. If you’re kind with yourself, it’s less likely that a lapse will turn into a long-term relapse.

Chutes and Ladders In the board game Chutes and Ladders (or Snakes and Ladders), you roll dice and move your piece along squares on the board accord- ingly. If you land on a square with a chute, you have to slide down the chute to a lower square. If you land on a square with a ladder,

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you get to climb the ladder, skipping a bunch of squares and moving into a winning position faster. The first player to get to the top square wins.

Our efforts to stick to healthy habits can be a lot like Chutes and Ladders. There will be times when you stop doing your healthy habit and it feels like you have to start at the beginning again. This is like hitting a chute and sliding back to an earlier square. But the more you work on getting back to doing your healthy habit, the more often you will hit ladders. That is to say, you will get back to where you were faster than the first time you had to get back to your healthy habit.

Here’s a concrete example. When I was trying to establish a regular habit of exercise, I caught a cold and stopped going to the gym. This was like hitting a chute. It was a month before I got back to the gym. When I started going again, it felt like starting over. I was sore after workouts and it felt really hard to get back at it. But I kept at it. The next time I stopped going to the gym it only took two weeks to get back to going again instead of four weeks. I had hit a ladder. I got back to where I had been with my fitness faster than after the first time I stopped going to the gym. If you keep at it, it will get easier to get back to your healthy habit each time you stop engag- ing in it. You will hit more ladders and get back to where you were faster.

What to Do When You Fall Off the Wagon Responding to ourselves with self-compassion when we fall off the wagon is an effective way to get back on the wagon. Although it’s a common cultural belief that being hard on ourselves can motivate

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us, the research doesn’t support this idea. While being hard on your- self can sometimes help you get started with a new behavior, it rarely helps you keep it up, and often it can undermine your efforts. In contrast, research has shown that being kind to yourself in the face of setbacks can help you persist at difficult tasks (Hope, Koestner, and Milyavskaya 2014; Neely et al. 2009).

After falling off the wagon, many people decide to get back to it by doing all their health behaviors at once. My client, John, had fallen off the wagon and was determined to get back on it full force: “I’ve got to start counting my calories and get back to walking every day and start measuring my portions and start bringing my lunch to work every day.” Does that sound daunting and overwhelming? Of course it does! And if you’ve attempted to get back on the wagon in this manner, you’ve probably struggled. The trick to getting back to your health behaviors more quickly is to ease yourself back onto the wagon so it’s not such a punishing task.

Before you fall off the wagon (that is, right now), identify the simplest, easiest SMART goal related to your healthy habit (see chapter 3) that you can reach for that would symbolize getting back on the wagon. Think about adding or doing things (for example, eating more vegetables, drinking a glass of water, or going for a ten- minute walk) instead of not doing things or taking things away (for example, don’t eat fast food, stop eating chocolate). Here are some steps you can take to get back on the wagon in a compassionate way:

1. Notice what happened. (For example, “I was trying to watch my portions but I ended up at a buffet and ate until I was stuffed.”)

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2. Notice how your self-critical passenger will judge you auto- matically. (For example, Why did I do that? What’s the matter with me? I can’t believe I undid all my hard work. This is never going to work!)

3. Respond to that judgment with curiosity and an observer perspective. (For example, “Wow! Look at how my mind is judging me. It’s sure working hard to try to motivate me.”)

4. Recognize that whatever choice you made, you were likely acting just like a human being is supposed to. (For example, “My body and mind have evolved to prefer sugary, fatty, salty foods and to eat as much as possible whenever it’s available, so eating everything at the buffet is exactly what my body has evolved to do.”)

5. Congratulate yourself. (For example, “Congrats! I am a well-functioning human.”)

6. Remind yourself that almost everyone else has done the same thing. (For example, “We’ve all overeaten.”)

7. Give yourself a hug, tell yourself something kind, and imagine what your compassionate passenger might say. (For example, “You’re a human like everyone else, and we all make mistakes. Just get back on the wagon.”)

8. Use the SMART goal you’ve already identified to get back on track. Try to get back to your behavior as soon as possi- ble: before you finish the bag of chips, after dinner, or before bed. Don’t wait until tomorrow morning, next Monday, or January 1.

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9. With kindness and self-compassion ease yourself back onto the wagon with your easy, healthy SMART goal that you identified ahead of time. Congratulate yourself for being a well-functioning human who can respond to yourself with kindness in the face of setbacks and personal failings.

Passenger Tricks After you’ve fallen off the wagon it can be useful to review what your passengers did to help knock you off your route, what “passenger tricks” they used. Did they convince you that you couldn’t do some behavior or that you shouldn’t, or did they put you on automatic pilot? Some of my personal favorites (that is, the ones my passengers love telling me) are “There’s ice cream. You love ice cream! It’s your favorite!” Or “You’ve had such a long hard day. You deserve a treat.” Or “You don’t have time for that.”

As I mentioned already, your passengers aren’t out to get you, nor are they trying to harm you—quite the opposite. They are doing their best to take care of you. And if you were a cave person, their suggestions would likely be very helpful for short-term survival. But because we live in modern times, there’s a good chance that their suggestions will lead you away from your values and healthy habits. Falling for passenger tricks with regularity won’t help you stick to your healthy habits in the long term.

The first step to overcoming passenger tricks is to recognize that they are never going away. Once your mind finds what it thinks is a survival strategy, it will never let go of it. And, of course, this is very appropriate in an evolutionary context. Remember that cave person

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from earlier in the book who survived a bear attack but then forgot all about it. He is not our ancestor. A well-functioning mind, one equipped for survival, would remember this bear attack and remind the survivor of it whenever possible. Even if this person moved to the Sahara Desert, where bears don’t live, he’d still remember the bear attack. This is how the mind works.

So, you can’t rid yourself of passenger tricks, but you can develop skills so you are less likely to fall for them. Think of it this way: Like most people, you probably receive spam in your inbox either warning you of something terrible (“Your accounts have been frozen”) or exciting (“You’re the winner of a huge jackpot”), and all you have to do is click on the link to fix your account or collect your prize. If you’ve ever clicked one of these links, you likely opened a virus that wreaked havoc on your computer. We can’t stop the spam from arriving, but we can stop ourselves from clicking the link, and the same is true of our passengers. We can’t stop the passengers from offering the tricks, but we don’t have to fall for them. I touched on some of these tricks in previous chapters, but we’re going to review a few more and look at ways to deal with them.

Why?

“Why” questions—Why can’t I control my eating? Why do I have such a bad relationship with food? Why can’t I quit smoking? Why do I hate exercise so much?—all result in the same thing: an exploration for the underlying reasons why you are behaving the way you are behaving. This type of questioning is very normal. It’s part of our default problem-solving brain. And it’s very effective for

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solving problems in the external environment. For example, asking yourself why your shelter keeps falling apart increases the likelihood that you’ll figure out how to fix it. However, this same “why” ques- tioning is typically not as effective for addressing our own behavior.

Here’s an example of the problem with spending too much time focusing on the “why.” During most of our sessions Wendy con- stantly wanted to try to get to the bottom of why she turned to drinking when she was stressed. The first problem with this type of thinking is that there are a huge number of factors that influence our behavior. Here are just a few of the factors that impacted Wendy’s use of alcohol in response to stress: her physiological response to alcohol, her expectations about the calming effects of drinking, having seen her parents have cocktail hour after a long day at work, her circle of friends who always had a drink at social functions. The human mind is incapable of pinpointing all the factors that influ- ence our behavior and their relative contributions to our behavior. The second problem is that even if we could somehow figure out what caused her relationship with alcohol, what then? Could Wendy do anything about her parents’ cocktail hour or about her physiolog- ical response to alcohol? No! There is no “fixing” these contribu- tions to the problem the way we can “fix” the factors contributing to our shelter falling down.

So trying to figure out why you behave a certain way is a trick of the mind, of your passengers. You’ll waste incredible amounts of time with very few results for your efforts. Thus, rather than focusing on the “why,” focus on what the passengers tell you in the here and now that leads you to drink (or smoke or eat too much or skip the

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gym). Focusing on how the passengers knock you off course in the here and now is more likely to change your behavior than under- standing “why” you behave that way.

I Deserve a Break

I’ve had a hard day. I deserve a break. Ever had a thought like that? Isn’t it interesting that our passengers never seem to say, “You should treat yourself with some healthy broccoli.” Nope. If your mind is like most minds, it will suggest drinking or smoking or avoid- ing the gym or consuming some sugary, salty, fatty food.

Our passengers’ suggestion for an unhealthy break is all about a short-term fix, not the long-term consequences. No surprises here, as our brain evolved to be very focused on surviving in the now with little thought of the future. I’m not going to try to convince you that you don’t deserve a break. You do! I just want you to learn to notice when your passengers are suggesting a short-term fix to how you’re feeling, and that these can lead to long-term harm.

Below are some alternative ways to take a break that engage at least one of the five senses. Keep in mind that none of these options will be as effective at answering your passengers as eating or smoking or drinking, because you’re hardwired to respond positively to these actions. Taking a relaxing bath will never be as easy or enjoyable as eating a chocolate bar on the way home from work, so be mindful of your expectations. But also remember that these alternative breaks won’t cost you much in the long run.

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Touch

Caress a silk scarf or a fleece blanket.

Place a warm or cold washcloth on your face.

Cocoon yourself in a blanket.

Wear your favorite outfit.

Take a relaxing bath.

Sight

Watch your favorite movie.

Look at a sentimental object (jewelry, pictures).

Look at beautiful pictures.

Hearing

Listen to a water fountain.

Play your favorite music.

Smell

Light a candle.

Try aromatherapy.

Taste

Sip hot or cold tea.

Chew gum.

Suck on a mint.

If it doesn’t seem like any of these options might work, you can come up with your own, or you can try bringing to mind your com- passionate figure. Imagine how she might comfort you. Think about her sitting beside you, maybe putting her arm around you and saying something comforting, like “It’s going to be okay.” Lastly, spend some money if you need to: buy a trashy magazine, new makeup, or a woodworking tool, or get your nails done or have a massage. If doing this feels too luxurious, remind yourself that you would have spent money on food or alcohol or cigarettes anyway, so it’s okay to spend money to avoid using these unhealthy habits as a treat.

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However, I leave you with this caveat: be mindful of not overdoing it, as “retail therapy” (feeling good through shopping) can also have some long-term negative consequences.

She’s Naturally That Way

One of my friends from my kid’s school is very thin. She has four children and is probably a size zero. When she walks in a room, one of the other mothers who’s present invariably says something like “How does she look like that?” And someone will answer, “Oh, she’s just naturally that way.” As our friendship developed, I realized there was much more to the picture than this oft-repeated refrain. For example, she once told me about a power outage that had occurred at her house, during which the power was only on for an hour in a twenty-four hour period. Guess what she did for that one hour. Do you think she prioritized what I normally do in such a situation? Charging my cell phone, downloading videos to watch offline, making some food… Wrong! She ran on her treadmill.

And then there was the night I went out to dinner with this same mom and some other friends. After about an hour I realized we had only talked about weight-management strategies the whole time: “What do you eat for breakfast?” “What kind of protein powder do you like best?” “What’s the healthiest drink to have at a restau- rant?” This is not my typical conversation when I go out for supper. This mom also had a long conversation with the waitress about the healthiest food option on the menu, and she ended up ordering a salad. I’m pretty sure I had a burger and fries. So contrary to the myth that some people are just “naturally that way,” most of us, including this mom, have to work hard at it.

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Convincing you that everyone else has it easy and it’s just you who has to work at a particular behavior is an old passenger trick. This line of thinking usually ends with a “Why bother?” and a justi- fication for you to move away from your healthy habits. It’s true, there are people who are naturally a size zero (or who quit smoking the first try or who run a 10K race without training), but they are the exception, not the rule. Apparently even Gisele Bündchen follows a sugar-free, plant-based diet.

But My Values Conflict

Clients often perceive that there’s a conflict between engaging in healthy habits and being an engaged parent, both of which are values. One of my clients had diabetes and had to monitor his blood sugar during the day. He found this disruptive because he couldn’t participate continuously in family events. So one of his passengers convinced him that his values were in conflict, and he needed to choose between the two.

I asked him why managing his blood sugar was important? “So I can stay healthy,” he said. Why did he want to stay healthy? “So I can be around for my daughter.” Thus, we uncovered that his values were not in conflict, rather they went together. Managing his blood sugar was just another way to express his value of being an engaged parent. If you have a passenger telling you your values conflict, explore them more deeply. Sometimes what seems like a conflicting value is just a different way of expressing the same value. For example, healthy habits can be your way of expressing being an engaged parent.

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I Might as Well Give In

We all face different kinds of urges or cravings. They might be for food or to spend money shopping or to drink or to smoke. And most of us worry that these urges or cravings will go on forever, increasing in intensity unless we give in to them. In fact, our pas- sengers may convince us that the only way to manage them is to give in to them. This is another trick. Urges or cravings are actually more like waves. They will rise, peak, and then dissipate just as ocean waves do on the beach. So I invite you to try this next exercise, imagining that your urge or craving is like a wave, and you are a surfer (inspired by Lillis, Dahl, and Weineland 2014).

First, think of an urge or craving you have. Imagine the food,

or drink, or cigarette that prompts that craving until you notice

it showing up in you. Can you explore this urge or craving like

a curious scientist, as if you’ve never encountered it before?

What does it feel like? Where do you feel it most intensely in

your body? What thoughts or feelings come up? Can you

notice these with nonjudgmental curiosity?

This urge or craving is part of being a human. It exists

because you are a well-functioning human. See if you can

imagine dropping the struggle with the urge or craving? Can

you imagine making space for these sensations with curiosity

and kindness? We are used to just giving in to cravings, so

see if you can stick with the feelings with willingness and

openness without having to make them go away.

Now, imagine that this urge or craving is like a wave, and

you’re riding this wave with your breath. Notice the sensations

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of the urge or craving as they rise and eventually peak. With

each breath make space for these sensations. With each

breath notice the sensations with willingness. Imagine that with

each breath you can surf this wave of craving and you can ride

it to the shore as it crests and dissipates on the beach.

With practice you can develop the skill of surfing your urges or cravings. In order to improve this skill, you need to encounter urges or cravings without giving in to them, so it’s best to practice with your easiest urges or cravings first, working your way up to the hardest ones. So if drinking beer is a craving of yours, don’t try to surf your cravings for beer (rather than giving in to your craving and drinking beer) when you’re at a bar surrounded by beer. Try some- thing easier first; try surfing the craving by imagining a beer. Once you’re good at surfing your cravings for beer while imagining beer, then you can move on to more difficult situations (such as when there is an actual beer nearby). Notice that I’m suggesting that you should get to know your cravings better rather than avoiding them. Willingness to experience cravings is a big part of creating a differ- ent relationship with them.

I Hate Exercise

One of my clients started exercising at the gym as an expression of her value of creativity. That is, she recognized that exercising at the gym left her calmer, in a better mood, and consequently more creative. “How is the exercise going?” I asked her during one of our sessions. “Awful,” she said, “I hate exercise. I’m just not an exercise

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person.” I decided to probe this line of thinking with a few ques- tions: What did she notice before she went to the gym? What did she notice while exercising? Before she went she felt mostly dread, and while at the gym she felt pretty uncomfortable. These answers seemed to correlate with her hatred of exercise, so I then asked her what she felt after she exercised. She said that she noticed a feeling of pride. Before this inquiry she hadn’t noticed this feeling because her passengers had hijacked the story of her exercise. They had convinced her that the whole thing was awful and glossed over the pride aspect.

We can get caught up in old stories—“I’m not that kind of person,” “I hate exercise,” and so on—that describe an experience quite differently from what we actually experienced from moment to moment. Just as my client only remembered what she hated about exercise, you, too, may be overlooking positive aspects of some expe- rience of yours. Try using present-moment awareness to observe what you experience before, during, and after you engage in certain health behaviors. Remember, it’s quite likely that the before and the during may not be pleasant (avoiding the gym is more likely to feel good in the short term than is having for a hard workout). It’s the after where you’ll notice the biggest difference (if you avoid the gym you’re likely to feel guilty, disappointed, or angry with yourself, whereas if you go to the gym you’re likely to feel proud and capable). You may discover that your passengers are hijacking your experi- ences. (The “Value-Consistent Behavior” worksheet, available at http://www.newharbinger.com/43317, can help you explore this further.)

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Don’t Fall for It When I try to put my eight-year-old son to bed, right when I’m about to turn off the lights, he often says, “I have to go to the bathroom,” or “I need some water,” or “I’m hungry.” Over time I learned to make sure that he goes to the bathroom, has a drink of water, and has some food before we start the bedtime routine. Now when he says these things I know he’s just trying to get out of going to bed. I can say to him, “Oh, I know this trick, and I’m not falling for it.” And then I tell him I love him and I’ll see him when he wakes up. And I turn off the lights.

You’ll never be able to stop your passengers from trying to trick you. Your job, as it was for me with my son, is to notice their tricks and to not fall for them.

Choice Point Having read this chapter, you can add more information to the choice point worksheet. You can write down several of the common tricks passengers play on us under “passengers that get in the way.” Pick the ones that are more common or convincing for you (for example, “I deserve a break”). You can also add several skills related to getting back on the wagon (being kind to yourself, easing yourself back onto the wagon, identifying a SMART goal related to your healthy habits) and ways to not fall for passenger tricks (for example, thanking passengers or reminding yourself to “not click the spam link”). For example, when I’m trying to get to the gym my passengers often try to trick me with the “But it’s true” trick (usually related to

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the thought I’m too tired to go to the gym). So that’s something I could write under “passengers that get in the way.” I use the skill of remind- ing myself that it’s a trick and I shouldn’t fall for it, and I go to the gym anyway. I could include this under “skills.”

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CHAPTER 9

How Doctors Choose to Die

When faced with a terminal illness, many doctors don’t choose all the life-prolonging treatments they often so readily offer their patients (White 2014). Instead they often choose to go home to die surrounded by family. This suggests that when they’re faced with a terminal illness, many doctors choose quality of life over quantity. Ironically, many do the opposite for their patients, offering them quantity of life sometimes over quality of life.

The health care system is designed to prolong life, not to ensure better quality of life. It’s well designed for acute illness and injury, and health care providers are taught to fix problems. With all the best intentions, many get caught up in the urge to fix patients. A physician once recounted to me the story of a patient asking if she was going to die. No, was his quick response, because he was trying to reassure her. And yet his response was entirely false. We are all going to die. Like many health care providers, many physicians are not well equipped to support quality-of-life choices over quantity. In general, the main goal of the health care system is to keep people alive, regardless of quality.

I remember doing an assessment with a woman who was consid- ering a liver transplant. She had end-stage liver disease, meaning

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that without an intervention she would die. During the assessment she expressed ambivalence about undergoing a transplant, instead talking about wanting to just spend time with her grandchildren rather than undergoing major surgery. I remember being horrified. This poor woman, she doesn’t understand that she needs to undergo this transplant to live a longer life. I tried to convince her to pursue a transplant. My efforts, and likely the efforts of the other transplant team members, scared her enough to convince her to undergo the surgery. The surgery itself went fine, but her recovery was far from ideal. She spent most of the following year in the hospital, where she died roughly one year after her surgery, surrounded by machines, not her family. I don’t think she spent more than five days at home, and she certainly didn’t spend meaningful time with her grandchildren. This case had a big impact on me. I realized that I was caught up in the same fix-it urge that many of my colleagues were, wanting to extend life rather than considering quality of life.

I handled the next patient who was ambivalent about having a transplant differently. He told me that if I could guarantee the surgery would improve his quality of life, then he’d definitely do it. I was honest with him. I told him there was no guarantee of that, as its purpose was to extend life. I said, “Some people do recover and have better quality of life, but not everyone. It’s okay if you don’t want the surgery. It’s okay if you decide you just want go home and spend the time you have left with your family.” He left the hospital a few days later, and after a few weeks he died at home.

I had a colleague who was asked to speak to a patient who had just had her second leg amputation because of complications with diabetes. Much to the horror of her doctors this patient was still smoking, and my colleague’s task was to try to get her to stop

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smoking. My colleague gave her the spiel about how detrimental smoking was, especially for people with diabetes. The patient responded, “Look, I know I’m not gonna live a long life. Smoking is the last thing that’s enjoyable in my life.” My colleague looked at her and said, “I hear ya. Go enjoy your life.” There’s no debate about whether smoking is bad for your health. It clearly is. But my col- league recognized that the patient was choosing quality of life over quantity.

I’ve spent most of the book trying to help you live a healthier life. But here’s the thing: it doesn’t really matter to me if this book made you healthier. What matters to me is that being healthier has helped you live a more meaningful, purposeful, vibrant life. My question is not do you want to live longer, it’s what are you going to do with your extra years of life? From my perspective, any effort put toward being healthier is meant to be in service of your values, of living a life that matters to you.

When we hit holiday time at the obesity clinic, clients would say that they were just going to skip holiday parties that year in order to manage their weight. Sure, that’s definitely a strategy to employ, but at what cost? You might end up reducing or holding your weight if you skip all social functions, but your quality of life suffers. There are many costs to choosing healthy habits, and you may decide that some are not consistent with your values. For example, when it’s up to me to choose my meals, I tend to make plant-based meals. But if I get invited to someone’s house for dinner, I don’t tell them I need a vegan meal, and I don’t bring a vegan meal with me. That’s because this meal with a friend isn’t just about food. It’s about the host offering something they’ve made; it’s about their efforts to plan and create a meal and to welcome and host me. So I

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choose not to disrupt those aspects by insisting on following my plant-based diet at all cost.

Best weight (Freedhoff and Sharma 2010) is a weight-manage- ment idea based on the smallest number of calories one can consume daily that still allows the person to enjoy each day. Best weight is the weight you can achieve while living the healthiest lifestyle you can truly enjoy. I think this strategy can be expanded to include all healthy habits. You don’t have to pick the healthiest option every time (and beat yourself up if you don’t). It’s okay to choose some- thing just a little bit healthier than what you were choosing before, and to balance healthy habits with living a life that matters.

You may be thinking that I’m suggesting that quality of life and quantity of life are opposites, and if you choose one you can’t choose the other. Often our mind seems to only give us two options to choose from, either quality of life or healthy habits. This line of rea- soning is similar to that passenger who tricks you into believing your values are in conflict. But there’s the third option: healthy habits do contribute to quality of life.

I went to a conference where Dr. Kenneth Rockwood, an expert on aging and frailty, discussed the impact of healthy habits on life span (Rockwood 2017). He showed a picture of a ninety-year-old man running a marathon and said this man had died shortly after the picture was taken. He explained that healthy living doesn’t just extend your number of years on Earth, it also extends the number of quality years you have on Earth. He pointed out that a rapid decline at the end of one’s life is actually the ideal scenario. This marathon runner had spent most of his life being able to do the things that mattered to him. He had a rapid decline near the end and spent only a few days in the hospital before passing away. Thus, he only spent a

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small part of his life having a low quality of life—and this was the effect of his healthy habits.

A New Stick to Beat You With? I had a client who told me she was really put together. She had a good job that she was good at, and she had good friends and a great family. What she couldn’t figure out was why she couldn’t manage her eating and her weight. She burst into tears as she wondered out loud, “Why can’t I get control over this? I should be able to control my eating! I should be able to manage this!” This is a familiar tale.

Many people who are incredibly successful in most aspects of their life struggle to “control” their healthy habits, and there are many reasons why this is so common. First, smoking, drinking, and sleeping instead of going to the gym are all preferences of your cave person brain. Remember the cave person who chose to rest rather than go for a run, and thus he had the energy to outrun a predator? His choices were beneficial as a cave person but aren’t necessarily the healthy ones in our modern world. When it comes to eating and weight, there are layers of systems in the brain and body that ensure we don’t starve to death (chapter 1), and these systems are difficult to “control.” The moment you stop engaging your frontal lobe, your cave person brain will take over, and you’ll do things consistent with avoiding starving to death (for example, eating when you’re not hungry; eating until the plate is empty; choosing foods high in sugar, salt, and fat). Remember that almost any healthy habit is going to violate the principles of your caveperson brain—that is, your hardwiring!

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Second, our environment, especially in developed Western nations, is full of triggers for unhealthy habits—especially those related to food. Driving down the street you’re bombarded with fast- food restaurants and billboards showing foods of every stripe. Practically every commercial on TV sends you signals to eat. Office, school, and social functions are full of the unhealthiest food. Your kids’ sporting events include deep-fried options, rarely vegetables. This extends to most other healthy habits. We have all kinds of machines that reduce our physical activity: cars, washing machines, grocery stores. Most of us have jobs that are sedentary. Alcohol and cigarettes have been adapted by industries to make us like them more. Although you may be very capable of controlling yourself in many areas of life, it shouldn’t surprise you that sticking to any healthy habit is much more difficult.

Third, many “successful” people have used problem-focused coping (chapter 7) to great results in life, rarely needing to use emo- tion-focused coping. The long-term management of health, however, requires emotion-focused coping, because many aspects of health don’t have a “fix.” For example, quitting smoking requires us to manage cravings on an ongoing basis (no fix). Exercise is only effec- tive when we do it regularly, so we have to keep exercising for it to impact our health (once again, no fix). So if you’ve been successful as a result of using problem-focused coping most of your life, it makes sense that you’d lack the emotion-focused coping strategies needed to manage long-term health. You haven’t needed them to be successful.

And, fourth, there are all the factors we went over in chapter 2 that you have little control over and yet influence your struggle with weight or sticking to healthy habits. How many of them seemed

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relevant to your struggles? Did you choose your parents or your ancestors? Did you choose your genetics or to be born in a Western culture inundated with unhealthy triggers, including those related to food? Did you choose to have a cave person brain focused on sur- vival? No! Of course you didn’t, but they affect you nonetheless.

Reviewing this information with clients is meant to induce self- compassion, showing them some of the roadblocks to healthy living. I’ve noticed that some of my clients’ passengers hijack this info and use it against them instead. The same “put-together” client who cried about not being able to control her eating was one of these. Knowing about the evolutionary and cultural reasons why she strug- gled to control her eating made her feel worse. Why? Because now she really knew better, and she’d been taught all sorts of skills from an expert (me, apparently), and she still couldn’t eat healthy all the time. Basically her self-critical passenger found a new stick to beat her with.

This book is not meant to be a new stick to beat yourself with. Just because you’ve read it and (hopefully) gained a new perspective and learned some new skills doesn’t mean that you now are going to be able to “control” your healthy habits permanently. This will always require effort. I have no expectation that going forward you’ll always choose the healthy option. In fact, I’m giving you permission to choose an unhealthy option—just do so because it’s a deliberate choice and not because your passengers have hijacked your bus. It all comes down to personal choice and what quality of life you’re com- fortable with. I find the “description, prediction, choice” model (Vallis 2015) useful for creating context for some of life’s choices:

Description: You have diabetes, but you like to eat sweets and tend to avoid testing your blood sugar.

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Prediction: There will be negative long-term consequences for your health if you don’t manage your blood sugar.

Choice: Are you okay with that?

It’s okay to say, “Yes, right now I’m going to pick the short-term benefit.” Remember, the content of this entire book is in the service of you leading a vibrant, meaningful life, not just to make you skin- nier, or have lower cholesterol, or eat healthier, or stop smoking.

Keeping It Going This book has been about sticking to healthy habits in the long term. By now your choice point worksheet should include a lot of information that you can use to help you stick with your healthy habit, including the values you identified, your SMART goal to help you express your values, the different passengers (for example, thoughts, feelings, sensations, memories, cravings, and tricks) that might get in your way, as well as a range of skills, including mindful- ness, present-moment awareness, self-compassion, taking care of feelings, and so forth.

Let’s review the worksheet using my illustrative example of “exercise more.” I’ve now clarified my values about this goal (to be strong) and turned it into a SMART goal (exercise two times per week for twenty minutes). I’ve pinpointed the most common pas- sengers that get in my way, including thoughts like I don’t have time for that or feeling tired. I’ve recognized that my self-critical passenger is likely to criticize me (“It’s never going to work”) and make me feel even less motivated to go the gym. I’ve also documented some of the skills that work best for me to keep me moving toward what matters.

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Thanking passengers, compassionate hands, putting down the foot- ball, and present-moment awareness are the ones that I use most often to help me stick with my healthy habit. So now when a pas- senger—for example, “I don’t have time for that”—shows up, I can notice it and make a choice about whether to move toward or away from what matters to me. Rather than acting automatically and doing what my passengers are telling me to, I have created a moment of choice. Do I want to follow my “I don’t have time for that” pas- senger (which will move me away from my values), or do I want to try to move toward my values? This is my choice point. I use various skills (for example, thanking the passengers) to try to move myself just a bit more toward sticking to my healthy habit.

Hopefully by making use of the choice point worksheet and all the skills from this book you can give yourself more choice points— that is, more moments when you can consciously decide to stick to your healthy habit. Healthy living requires effort and a willingness to do the hard work of managing behaviors, even when you don’t want to.

Conclusion A year has passed since I started writing this book. I still haven’t lost all my “divorce weight.” Yes, I’m sure you were hoping that at the end I would finally give you the magic secret to losing weight, or to quitting smoking, or to exercising more. Sorry! Am I healthier? Hell, yeah. I now work out regularly five to six times a week. It took me three years to get into the habit of going to boot camp three times a week. Now when I don’t go I feel a bit odd. Even still, when the alarm goes off at 5:30 a.m., I still think I don’t want to go to boot camp.

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I wish I could stay in bed. And while I’m at boot camp I curse my trainers most of the time. (Love you, Mitch and Matt! See https:// evolvefitnessltd.fitproconnect.com/transformationcanada.) I remind myself often that it’s my job to do my health behaviors; what my body does with them isn’t up to me. There are still many parts of my body that make me cringe. But I really love what my body can do. It will dance when I want to dance. It will climb when I want to climb. And it will run when I want to run. So I’m grateful to my body for the things I can do, for the ways in which my body and my health help me live the life that really matters to me.

So as you embark on this lifelong journey, I don’t wish for you to be happy or to have high self-esteem. As we’ve already discussed, happiness and self-esteem are unhelpful life goals. I do hope you have opportunities for joy. I hope you are as healthy as you can be. I hope your health helps you live a vibrant, purposeful, and meaning- ful life that really matters to you. I hope you are kind to yourself for all the ways you will fall off the wagon. (Congrats, you’re human!) I hope when you get to the end of your life you look back and think, Damn, I lived a good life. So thank you for spending time with me and this book. I thank you and all your passengers for being with me. May you be well.

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