I feel like all the time I’m saying, “Well it depends” when someone asks me a personal question about diet or exercise.

Because the problem (or the good thing) about diet and exercises is that there are a lot of different things that work…You just have to find the one that works for you.

So my next question is…”How well do you know yourself?”

Because the better you know yourself, the more you can figure out what diet and exercise program will work for you.

What foods do you crave most? What has led you to fail in the past? What helps you stay in a routine? What motivates you when you feel like giving up? What causes you to lose motivation? What exercises do you enjoy the most? What type of workouts have you done in the past? Does tracking help hold you accountable? Does eating certain foods trigger your desire to eat worse foods? Are you an all or nothing type of person?

These are just some of the questions you can ask yourself to figure out how to create a program that will help you stay on track.

Because what works for someone else, won’t necessarily work for you. You need to tailor things to meet your specific needs – your specific problems and goals.

You need to know your triggers. What causes you to want to eat badly? What causes you to want to skip your workouts?

Consider these things when you create your plan.

Don’t plan to eat a cookie every night if you know that cookie will cause you to binge. Maybe pick a sweet treat that will help you stay on track. Or maybe skip the sweets altogether if you know they will trigger cravings.

Or if you know that not being able to have anything sweet will lead to a binge, treat yourself to a little sweet every day.

Like for me…I love dessert. I grew up having dessert every night and I feel deprived when I don’t get dessert.

Therefore, I have dessert every night….Or well every night I want it. Sometimes, and this is probably because I allow myself to have it if I want it, I don’t end up eating dessert because I’m not craving it.

For me it is not only about the sweet, but also about the lack of restriction. I don’t feel deprived because I can have it if I want it.

And when I am craving dessert, I’ve found healthy alternatives to more unhealthy desserts because I then get the sweet I’m craving while still staying on track. Because I’ve found, at least right now, that I can’t just have one cookie. If I have one…I want 12.

So for me a healthy dessert is the way to go…And then I save my 12 cookies for my cheat day. Because this works for me.

I like eating till I have a food baby.

Weird? Maybe.

But it works for me. I like the way I feel when I eat clean. And I like my day to overindulge. Both feel good because of the balance.

That doesn’t mean it will work for you. For you a cheat day (and yes…I LIKE calling it a cheat day…I don’t think of it as cheating on anything..it is just what I like to call it!) may lead to you falling off your diet.

For you, indulging a little every day may work better.

But you have to know yourself and even experiment to find what works for YOU.

And as you experiment, don’t be afraid to change things up; HOWEVER, you do need to give things a chance to actually work. Don’t just try something for one day and give up when you don’t see instant results.

Also, you need to truly give things a shot. Part of knowing yourself is also recognizing whether or not you truly stuck to your program.

Often we “think” we’ve done the right things and aren’t getting results, when, in reality, we didn’t stick to our plan at all.

That is when RECORDING and TRACKING can help us learn more about ourselves and what works.

Actually tracking is probably one of the best ways to learn about our triggers and what works for us.

Start setting yourself up for success in the New Year by tracking your current program to see what is working for you.

Consider your triggers. Recognize your specific needs.

Don’t force huge changes if you know drastic changes will lead to you eventually reverting back to old habits. Maybe make small slow steady changes and wait until one change becomes habit before adjusting something else.

So I ask you now, “How well do you know yourself?”

Do you know your triggers? Do you know what works and what doesn’t work for you?

Or do you just hop from thing to thing based on what other people say works for them?

And if you come to the conclusion that you don’t really know what works and doesn’t work for you, how are you going to track your next program (aka experiment) to learn what does and doesn’t work?

Start considering these things so you can achieve success with all of your goals in this coming year! Start setting yourself up for success NOW!