Building Bridges to Health

By - Tiffany King

0 Shares

About ten years ago, I had a mid-life awareness.

I realized that if I kept going the direction I was going with my eating and sedentary lifestyle, it would not lead me anywhere good.

I realized I could no longer rely on youth for my health. Instead, I was going to have to change some things.

Up to that point in my life, I’d never worked out at all. I never thought I would either.

I also never watched what I ate. I hadn’t needed to do that when I was younger.

But as I approached 50 years old, things changed.

Over the next ten years, I started moving in the direction of health. Now I’m in the best shape of my life. I’m stronger than I’ve ever been and I’m healthy.

How did I do it?

I built little bridges to health.

I started with walking. Then I reduced the amount of sugar I spooned into my coffee.

I tried various diets – intermittent fasting, carb cycling, Whole30…

Some worked for me, others didn’t. When something didn’t work, I moved on to try another new habit.

I kept upping my exercise program, aiming for harder workouts.

I gave up sugar entirely.

I tried eating whole food plant based, something that has worked for me.

Each change was like a bridge towards health.

The Tiny Bridge Method

Think of health like the city of Venice, Italy. Every bridge moves you deeper into the city and around each corner is another beautiful view.

Our healthy habits are like that. Build a bridge – a habit. Follow it to see where it leads.

If the habit works for you, leave that bridge intact and build another new bridge.

If the habit doesn’t work for you, move on to build another new bridge towards health.

Every habit bridge leads you towards energy and health.

Some of the bridges you build will be small, like how I reduced the sugar in my coffee.

Other bridges will need to be bigger, like giving up sugar entirely. Once you’ve built a number of small bridges that hold up, then you’re ready to build a big one.

By that point, you’ve proved to yourself that you can make healthy changes that stick and that it’s important to you to do so.