Becoming Who You Need to Become

I've written before about where to start when you're trying to become healthier. In that article, I talked about quality and consistency, and why both matter when you're trying to build a healthier lifestyle. But there's another idea I've been thinking about that I want to explore a little further.

Sometimes, becoming healthier isn't just about changing what you do. It's about becoming the kind of person who can make those changes and, perhaps more importantly, sustain them.

That might sound a little abstract, so let me explain.

When people begin a health journey, they often focus on the things they need to do. Eat better. Exercise more. Get more sleep. Lose weight. Improve their cholesterol or blood sugar. These are reasonable goals, but there's something underneath all of them that deserves attention. There are certain traits, or skills really, that make it easier to accomplish those things and continue doing them long after the initial excitement has worn off.

These skills aren't unique to health. They apply to work, relationships, learning, and just about anything in life that requires meaningful, sustained effort. But for now, let's look at them through the lens of becoming a healthier person.

Discipline

This is a big one.

Think about how many decisions you make throughout an ordinary day that influence your health. Whether to get up and exercise or stay in bed a little longer. Whether to prepare something nutritious or grab whatever happens to be convenient. Whether to have another drink, stay up for another episode of your favorite show, or get the sleep you know you need.

Every day presents opportunities to make choices that move you toward or away from the things you're trying to accomplish. Discipline is what helps you make those choices with your longer-term goals in mind, even when something else might sound better in the moment.

The donut sitting in the break room might look pretty good. So does the couch after a long day at work when you were planning to go for a walk. And another hour of television might seem much more appealing than going to bed.

Without much discipline, it's easy for the immediate reward to win. You stay up later than you intended, eat more than you wanted, or put off exercising until tomorrow. Any one of these decisions probably won't make much difference. But repeated often enough, they can gradually become the way you live.

And the reverse is true as well.

Discipline helps you make the choices that support the life you're trying to create. It's not about never eating a donut or always choosing exercise over rest. There are plenty of times when enjoying yourself, changing your plans, or taking a day off is perfectly reasonable. The point is developing the ability to choose intentionally instead of always doing whatever feels easiest or most appealing at the moment.

It also means recognizing that the benefits of your choices aren't always immediate. Going to bed on time might mean missing something you'd rather watch. Exercising might be uncomfortable. Preparing a healthy dinner might require more effort than ordering something. You're accepting a little inconvenience now because you understand what you're working toward.

This is one of the foundational skills of a healthier lifestyle, because you're going to have to keep making these decisions long after your initial motivation has faded.

Habit

Discipline and habit are closely related, but I think there's an important distinction between them.

Discipline helps you make a constructive choice when another option is more tempting. Habit develops when you've made that choice often enough that it starts to become part of your normal routine.

Think about brushing your teeth. Most people don't wake up every morning and have a lengthy internal debate about whether they should brush their teeth. They just do it. It's something they've repeated so often that it has become a normal part of their day.

Wouldn't it be useful if more of your healthy behaviors worked that way?

Maybe you get up in the morning and go for a walk because that's simply what you do. Maybe your usual grocery shopping includes foods you know will help you eat well throughout the week. Maybe you have a bedtime routine that you've followed so consistently that you rarely have to think about it.

That's the beauty of developing good habits. You're no longer relying on a fresh burst of motivation or a difficult act of discipline every time you need to make a decision.

This doesn't happen overnight, and not every habit becomes completely automatic. You still need to make deliberate choices, especially when your schedule changes, you're traveling, or life gets stressful. But the more you practice a behavior, particularly in a consistent setting, the easier it can become to repeat.

I think this is an important goal in itself. Instead of constantly asking yourself how to find the motivation to live healthier, you begin creating a life where many of those decisions are simply part of your routine.

And that gives you more room to focus on everything else you want to do.

Curiosity and Enjoyment

This one could also be called play.

I think it's an underappreciated part of building a healthier life, and perhaps one of the reasons so many people struggle to stick with their plans.

If every healthy decision feels like a chore, every workout is something you dread, and every meal is a reminder of what you're not allowed to eat, how sustainable is that really going to be?

You could theoretically make all the right choices, follow the perfect exercise program, and achieve wonderful numbers on your laboratory testing, but be completely miserable in the process. And if that's the case, what exactly are we accomplishing?

The point of becoming healthier isn't to build your entire life around perfect numbers or an idealized health regimen. The point is to become healthier so you can live the life you want to live.

That means we need to find ways to enjoy the process, or at least make it something we can reasonably and willingly incorporate into our lives.

This is where curiosity becomes useful.

Maybe you've heard that oatmeal is a great breakfast option, but you absolutely hate the taste and texture. That's fine. Find something else that provides similar nutritional benefits and that you actually enjoy eating. Maybe you hate running. You could try cycling, hiking, swimming, or another activity that challenges your cardiovascular system. Maybe you enjoy lifting weights but struggle to get yourself to do much cardio. How could you arrange your week to include both in a way that feels manageable?

That's actually something I deal with myself. I enjoy weightlifting much more than traditional cardio. But I also understand the benefits of cardiovascular fitness, and I feel better when I'm more aerobically conditioned. So I've had to find a way to include cardio in my weekly routine that works for me, even if I'd often rather spend that time getting stronger.

Someone else might have the opposite problem. They love running or cycling but don't particularly enjoy strength training. They may need to experiment with different ways of getting stronger that fit their preferences and schedule.

Neither person needs to follow the exact same plan.

This is where individualized health planning becomes meaningful. We're not simply asking what the healthiest possible regimen looks like on paper. We're asking what healthy regimen someone can realistically follow, enjoy, and maintain within the circumstances of their own life.

There will be compromises. Not everything that benefits your health will be enjoyable all the time, and enjoyment doesn't automatically make a choice healthy. But learning how to experiment, adjust, and create a lifestyle you actually like is an important skill.

Be curious. Try new things. See what works. Make adjustments when something isn't working. You don't have to get everything right on the first attempt.

Ideally, the process of becoming healthier should make your life better while you're doing it, not just when you finally reach some distant goal.

Patience

This may be the most important one.

We're surrounded by promises of quick results. Lose weight in a month. Transform your body in six weeks. Take a supplement to improve your metabolism. Follow a new training program and see dramatic changes almost immediately.

Some interventions, including medications, can produce meaningful benefits relatively quickly. But building and maintaining a healthier lifestyle is usually a much longer process.

It's the accumulation of decisions made over weeks, months, and years that creates lasting changes in how we live and, often, how our bodies function.

One workout isn't going to transform your fitness. One week of nutritious eating isn't going to undo years of poor habits. And a few nights of better sleep won't necessarily resolve everything that's been affecting your energy and recovery.

That doesn't mean those choices aren't helping. It means meaningful change often takes time, and the timeline will vary depending on what you're trying to accomplish.

This can be frustrating, particularly when you're putting in real effort without seeing the results you expected. It's easy to start questioning yourself. Maybe your body just doesn't respond like other people's. Maybe the program isn't working. Maybe you're doing something wrong.

Sometimes a plan really does need to change. There are situations where reassessing your approach, investigating other health factors, or getting professional guidance is appropriate. Patience shouldn't mean blindly continuing something that isn't helping.

But we also need to recognize that slow progress isn't necessarily a sign of failure.

Patience allows you to continue doing the things that matter while giving them enough time to work. It keeps you from abandoning a reasonable plan simply because the results aren't arriving as quickly as you'd hoped.

And patience, like discipline and habit building, is something you can practice and improve.

You don't have to be naturally patient to become more patient. You don't have to be naturally disciplined to develop greater discipline. These aren't fixed characteristics reserved for certain kinds of people.

They're skills, and skills can be learned.

The People and Environment Around You

There's one more element I want to include, because developing these skills doesn't have to be something you do alone.

Think about the people and influences around you. Your friends, family, coworkers, the professionals you work with, the things you watch and listen to, and the communities you're involved in.

All of these can influence how you think about your health and the choices you make.

It's easier to build an exercise routine when you have someone who enjoys being active with you. It's easier to maintain healthier eating habits when those around you support them. And when things get difficult, having someone who can offer encouragement, accountability, or a different perspective can make an enormous difference.

That might be a friend or family member. It might be a qualified coach, trainer, dietitian, or physician. It might be a group of people working toward similar goals.

Your environment matters, too. The foods you keep around the house, the way you organize your schedule, and how easy or difficult you've made certain behaviors can all affect your decisions. Discipline is valuable, but there's no reason to make every healthy choice unnecessarily difficult.

Ideally, you're creating an environment that makes the choices you want to make a little easier and supports the person you're trying to become.

Becoming Who You Need to Become

So when you're thinking about improving your health, I want you to consider something beyond the next workout, the next meal, or the next laboratory result.

Think about the person you need to become to live the healthier life you want.

What skills would that person have? How would they approach a difficult choice? What routines would be part of their day? How would they respond when progress was slow or when something didn't go as planned? Would they be curious enough to keep learning and flexible enough to change their approach when needed?

You don't have to become an entirely different person, and you certainly don't have to become perfect. You're developing skills that make it easier to live in a way that supports your health.

That's an important distinction. The goal isn't simply to make a few healthy decisions and hope the results last. It's to build the ability to make those decisions repeatedly, to enjoy the life you're building, and to keep going when things aren't easy.

Because achieving better health is one thing.

Becoming someone who can maintain it is another.