Here are some helpful tools I’ve used to assess and measure progress throughout my recovery and health management with my IBD.
- Stay present – we can really only work with here and now
- Empathize and connect – remember “Habit #3”?
- Listen and observe carefully – our bodies send us signals all the time. Listen to your gut and I’ll bet you observe helpful info.
- Looks for patterns – if doing “x” usually causes “y” (and we want more of “y”) then do more of “x”. If we notice that pattern we can gain improvements.
- Consider what will be effective right now – if you are in a hospital right now, follow the doctor’s advice to get you healthy enough to be released. Worrying about what will happen 6 months or 6 years from now is not very effective.
- Trust your gut – there is a direct link between our guts and our brains. Each shares information with the other. If you feel it in your gut then that is usually something to consider and look into.
You can choose what you’d like to measure to help assess how things are going. It could be something like:
- Number of smiles per day (mindset)
- How well I was able to eat to 80% full (nutrition)
- Checking your toe-touch (movement)
Using the saying “what gets measured gets managed” helps us gain awareness of our current situation and actions. The above tools will get you started on finding something helpful to assess and measure. And as noted in Habit 6, greater awareness fundamentally changes a situation and how we can respond to it.
Use this new insight to continue to improve how you feel – and act – with your IBD.
Try this:
Pick 1 assessment tool and use that for 3-7 days in a row to help gain better insight into your progress. If we measure something we are better equipped to improve it.
