Breaking Old Habits

Ive been recently trying to break two old and bad habits I have had for a long time and finding it extremely hard to do with sheer will. The first is biting my nails which is a disgusting habit I have always had and tend to do when im very nervous. Before I know it my nails are in pain because I bit them down to the skin. The second is overeating during meals which im trying to nip in the bud especially before I get older because my metabolism is slowing down and I have been gaining weight a bit.

Ive been trying for about a month for each of these habits but its ending up to be much harder than I thought. Many of these bad habits we have that we have been doing for a large part of our lives are just second nature to us now, which means that often we dont even realize we are doing them. Sometimes we need to take a step back and say “hey this is out of control”. I think for me the weight gain was a bit of an eye opening experience for the overeating but the nail biting habit is just something I have wanted to get rid of for a long time.

With the overeating, my goal is to be fit healthy and happy, but because of some of the anti-anxiety medication I take and generally just my age getting older, im am finding myself struggling to keep my weight growing. The problem with me and exercising is I like lifting weights, but because of the nerve pain in my chest from heart surgery I had at 22, its very painful to do. This means I mostly have to rely on cardio and diet better, which is very hard for me and something im trying to change.

I have always not had the healthiest diet, especially since I eat at weird times, I skip some meals and instead have snacks. Snacks are something I am trying to avoid as much as I can, or replace them with something healthy and filling like soup. The idea for me is to replace a bad habit with a good habit and hope it will eventually stick if I do it long enough. I am very much a creature of habit when it comes down to it which is good and also bad. If there is something that I have a habit of doing, it is very hard for me to stop, but if it is a good habbit like going to the gym, I will go every day. The key for me is to slowly slip good habits in that with weigh out the bad.

If I overeat maybe I can start running and doing cardio which could counter out some of the calories that I am overeating with. Actually the new place I am moving to is right next to a highschool track so I have been thinking of taking up running anyway, well see if that actually sticks. Cardio is very hard for me to do unless I have something to distract me like a game. I can run all day in soccer or basketball and not notice the exercise because my mind is focused on playing the game. Running around the track is quite different which is why it was never my preferred method of exercise but hopefully I can change things around. If you have any habits you are trying to change, let me know I would love to hear them, or any tips you have on how I might be able to stop mine.

-Calaber24