Now that you’ve written it down your health goal or goals for 2018, I have a question for you. Were your health goals really what you’d like to change about your health or was it limited by your thought process?

Here’s what I mean. Did you write down your goals or did you start to analyze your goal? You might think I’m talking about the what of the goal. I’m not; I’m talking about the how of your goal. It might go something like this:

“I really want to lose weight and finally get rid of the extra pounds I’ve gained. But to do that, I’ve got to be able to exercise and my knee is so bad, I can’t. Maybe I should see about getting my knee fixed first. But I don’t have any health coverage right now so I can’t afford it. I guess I’ll have to start by losing the weight, but how am I going to do that? There are so many diets, and I don’t know which to choose. Some of them are expensive, and I can’t afford that either. Maybe I’ll check out some programs online that don’t cost very much.”

You go from the goal—what you really want—to something that may be standing in your way that you have to do first. Instead of focusing on your goal, and you very well may have to address some of these issues, you pick something else you have to do first.

Let’s use the exercise obstacle to weight loss. My example picked the most complicated way of dealing with the issue, getting the knee repaired, instead of finding what you can do to exercise right now. You can do upper body exercise, swimming, or pool walking to relieve the pressure on your knee. Where there’s a goal, there’s a way, but you start with the what, not the how.

Now take another look at your health goals. If you allowed your thinking to get in your way, write down what you really want. You’ll figure out the how later, but it shouldn’t affect your goal setting.

Saturday I’ll focus on one goal that concerns many of us: keeping our brains as healthy and functional as we can for as long as we can.

What are you prepared to do today?

Dr. Chet