It's a new year and with that comes new year's resolutions. One of the top new year's resolutions is to focus more on health, whether that means to lose weight, eat better, get more exercise, go to yoga, or get more sleep, most of you set a goal for the new year that you hope to reach. But, how do you know what you are doing is really work? How do you hold yourself accountable?
Last year, I purchased a Jawbone Up, which is a band you wear around your wrist that is used to track your steps. The Jawbone up links to an app or website that you can use to track your success. By wearing the band daily, you can see how many steps you walk per day. For me, this helped to push me to get up every hour and take a brief walk around the office and get moving a bit.
What's great about the Jawbone Up is that it does more than just track your steps. By utilizing the app on my smartphone, I can put in all my meals/snacks for the day and use this to track what I eat and how many calories or grams of fat I am eating each day. Let's be honest, I could run 3 miles a day, but if I come home and eat pizza and ice cream each day, I'm not sure that's the track I want to be on for 2014. In addition to tracking what you put in your body, the Jawbone up will also track your sleep cycle. I personally function much better on 8 hours of sleep than 6 and by using my Jawbone Up I was able to track how long it takes me to fall asleep (record time was 4 minutes) and when and how long I'm in a deep sleep for. I don't know what it is, but there's something about waking up to see you had a solid nights sleep that gets me excited and ready to go for the day.
Not only does the Jawbone just track everything you do, but you can also set goals for yourself and you can join with others to track each other's goals and motivate each other. My husband and two of my aunts each starting wearing the Jawbone Up around the same time and we would send messages to each other to "Get Moving!" if we weren't showing enough progress. I had a goal of 10k steps each day and I didn't realize how hard it was for me to get there each day, unless I ran my 3 miles.
What's great about the Jawbone Up is that it's simple to use and at the end of the day you know how successful you were with the goals you have set for yourself. The Jawbone Up helps you be accountable for each day and it makes eating healthy and working out fun when you are tracking your progress and setting goals.
I've heard a lot about sleep monitors but I never knew someone who had one. Is the band comfortable to wear all day?
ReplyDeleteI joined an online fitness thing once but I would forget to log in to post. Is it easier when you have your phone reminding you?
Yes, the band is very comfortable to wear. They make them in small, medium and large sizes to fit each person comfortably. You can even set a reminder on the band so it will vibrate to alert you if you have not had any activity within a certain amount of time.
DeleteTheresa,
ReplyDeleteCongratulations on keep your New Year's resolution! I've heard of this technology, but didn't know anyone that had actually used one of these products. I'm glad to hear your results and will do a little more research and consider buying a Jawbone Up.
You seem to really taking advantage of all that it has to offer. That's a great recommendation.
Carolyn
Hi Theresa.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for telling us about this - and congrats on your resolution! I think the addition of "web 2.0" interactivity and community is a great idea. I know one of the reasons ballet is the only exercise I can stick to is that they take attendance and if you skip a class, you have to call in with a reason. Having others help keep you accountable - not to mention support each other - is truly fabulous!
-w
This sounds pretty cool! I used an app last year that used your phone to log your steps, plus you could log everything else as well, weight, food, etc. I would think the band would be more accurate though.
ReplyDeleteAwesome Theresa, thanks for sharing. I just got the new Jawbone UP 24 for Christmas from my son. I finally using it last week and learning my way around. I have been tracking my steps and just started sleep monitoring. I have to start adding meals. I used to use My Fitness Pal for meals and it was pretty good.
ReplyDeleteI feel like you helped me learn more about it's features so thanks! I really like it and excited to do more now.
Cari