After a period of following your diet and exercise program well, you can be proud of your accomplishments! These positive feelings help spur you on to a new goal.

What kinds of rewards do you give yourself for sticking to your diet and/or exercise plan?

How long do you go before rewarding yourself? A week? A month? Longer, shorter?

Do the rewards give you incentive to keep on going in the future?

Most of the time when we think of a reward, it involves chocolate, ice cream, or pizza! It can be difficult to brainstorm non-food goals, but over the years I've identified several that work well for me:

- a manicure for meeting a weekly goal
- a treat of a new book for a monthly goal
- new exercise equipment or clothing for each running race I finish
- a beautiful floral arrangement for meeting a monthly goal

I love the idea of flowers - it's not something I would normally do for myself, but it is a real "feel good" kind of reward.

Most of my rewards to myself revolve around doing something alone. I'm a stay-at-home mom, so alone time is hard to find. But, I like to schedule things like visiting friends or a few hours at the hair salon for a special cut, manicure, etc. if I meet a particular goal.

I think the key to a reward is that it's meaningful. For a stay at home mom, some time away from the kids is hard to come by on a regular basis, so it makes a great reward. I remember those days!