When life feels like an uphill battle 🏔️

I. Battling Uphill 🏔️

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. This odd expression reminds us that when things don't go as planned, you should make the best of them. Unfortunately, my life lemons look more like stress, poor sleep, overdue projects, injuries, arguments with my wife and kids (sometimes both simultaneously), anxiety, late trains, long days and the temptation to eat and drink my way out of it all.

Not too sure what type of lemonade that makes...

Okay, I’m being a tad dramatic, but you get the idea. During these times, it can be tempting to hit pause on health-related changes and come back when things have calmed down a bit. After all, life can feel like an uphill battle during those times. But what do you do when driving up a big hill? Do you put your car in neutral and hope for the best? I hope not. Instead, you drop into a lower gear to nudge your way up that hill. The same idea applies to health-related changes.

Low-hanging fruit (LHF) is an excellent example of small but actionable changes that keep nudging you forward, albeit slowly. They are perfect when you need to drop down a gear.

Each of us will define our LHF a little differently, but a general rule is something that's often greeted with "That's easy enough; I could do that" - to which the answer is "Good; do that then."

Here are some examples:

Getting off the tube a stop early to get some extra steps in.
Grabbing a side salad with your usual sandwich to get some extra veggies in.
Get a large water bottle for your desk to help you stay hydrated.
Swapping savoury office snacks for a protein-packed yoghurt for extra protein and helping with satiety.
Take five slow belly breaths each time you sit at your desk to help stimulate your parasympathetic nervous system, aka rest and digest.
Limiting caffeine after 2 PM to help improve sleep.
Doing a quick set of push-ups between household chores.

These changes may seem small, but they are all actionable. Will they be enough to transform your health and fitness? Probably not. But they will help you maintain focus, build consistency, and slowly nudge forward. So when life's "lemons" do drop away, you will be poised and ready to re-engage with the bigger changes.

What are your low-hanging fruits?