How to Transform Health Fears Into Forward Progress

Episode 4. Have you ever had a health scare (for you or a loved one) and been frustrated with yourself that it didn't propel you to make a big lifestyle change? On today's episode of the Motivation Made Easy podcast, I talk about our family's experience learning of our high genetic risk of cancer. I share this as one example of how external fear based motivation can be shifted to internal autonomous motivation and what this has looked like for us. A Personal Story Today we are getting personal. I talk first about about having basal cell carcinoma last year and how a recent experience brought up fears about our family history. I share that my husband has Lynch syndrome, a genetic mutation that greatly increases his risk (and potentially our kids) of many types of cancer. How to Transform Fear into Positive Progress When (Fear-Based) External Motivation Does Not Motivate Have you had a health scare in the past where you really hoped it would propel you to make habit changes in your life, but it didn't? I know this is extremely common, because I would often talk to patients about this. They might have recently had a heart attack and be incredibly frustrated with themselves that they weren't "taking it more seriously." I can relate to this, as I think many of us can. In the past, before I stopped dieting, I always hoped that health scares would motivate me to live a healthier life. I would try to use them as a reason for eating differently ("I have high cholesterol, I shouldn't have that") but really when push came to shove, it didn't work. The motivation was solidly in the external category. "A should" that was not transforming into any internal motivation any time soon. How to Merge the Eating Disorder & Weight Management Worlds in a Healthy Way We happened to find out about my husband having Lynch syndrome when I was working in a Preventive Cardiology clinic that recommended plant-based eating. Therefore, I decided to try out the Forks Over Knives Meal Planner as this