Healthful Habits: One Change at a Time

"Forward, forward let us range,

Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change."

{Alfred Lord Tennyson}

In October of 2009, my hubby found himself confined to our {very small} regional airport terminal for 5 hours while waiting for a new lightbulb to be delivered to replace the one that was burned out on the jet he was taking for a quick, overnight trip down south. Somewhere in the second or third hour, out of desperation he wandered into the airport bookshop looking for a diversion. The title of this book caught his eye and for the next few hours he was engrossed in its pages. While we have always made some lifestyle choices in an attempt to be more health conscious (i.e. avoiding margarine, drinking lots of water, regular exercise), it is really this moment that marks our beginning of more intentional choices to create healthful habits.

As we begin a new calendar year over two years later, our desire to become even more intentional about our consumer choices continues to grow. In order to build healthful habits in a manageable way while reducing the risk of "burnout", we are going to embrace the idea behind one little change. By making a single change to our lifestyle during each week of 2012, I hope our daily life reflects a whole host of healthful habits by the conclusion of this year. Small steps in a lifetime journey, all accomplished with little anxiety or pressure involved.

In order to accurately chronicle our entire journey, we would need to include a discussion of the changes we have implemented prior to this new year. Some of those actions include using aluminum-free deodorant, switching from bottled water to a purifying system, eliminating pesticide use in our home, reducing/ eliminating preservatives in our food, reducing exposure to plastics, incorporating organic meat/produce into our diet, and reducing/eliminating chemicals in our food/environment. As the year progresses I'll try to go back and address both our rationale and our implementation process for each of those steps. But for now I'll strive to be faithful in recording each little weekly change.