5 Healthy Habits to Cultivate in Your Family in the New Year

1. Family Bible Time

A healthy habit to cultivate in your family in the New Year is family Bible time. Implementing family Bible time will help your children learn more about the Bible, the Gospel, and God’s love for them. Even if your children are young, they will still benefit from family Bible time. Utilize shorter Bible studies for younger children and longer Bible studies for older children.

As you are organizing family Bible time, pick out what time of day is best for your family. It will only become a habit by being done at the same time every day, such as in the morning before school, after dinner, or before bedtime. Choose the time that is suitable for your family and stick with it.

All habits need to be fostered to become a lasting habit. This will require intentionality and discipline. Whenever you feel you and your family are slipping in this healthy habit, remember God and what He wants for your family’s life. He wants you, your spouse, and your children to learn more about Him, grow in your relationship with Him, and find comfort in His love. This cannot be done apart from cultivating a time each day to devote to reading God’s Word (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

2. Making Exercise Fun

Exercise is often viewed as a chore or a punishment, but it doesn't have to be. Exercise can be a lot of fun, and it is healthy for our bodies. We cannot be healthy and strong without exercising our bodies. Try to incorporate this healthy habit into your family’s life by taking a family walk, a family run, or going on a family bike ride.

Visiting a park is also a fantastic way to incorporate more movement into your day. Bring a soccer ball or a basketball to play soccer or basketball with your children. The main goal you want to teach your children is that exercise is fun and enjoyable. Exercise does not need to be demonized or viewed as a means to achieve a certain body image.

Model healthy exercise in your own life and incorporate your spouse’s help, too. By both you and your spouse modeling a healthy relationship with exercise, it will make your children more prone to want to add movement into their day. Try to help your child focus on how exercise makes them feel and how much joy it brings them.

3. Healthy and Nourishing Meals

Intricately connected with exercise, parents need to ensure their family is having healthy and nourishing meals. While there is nothing wrong with take-out or a late-night pizza, families need to try to find a way to introduce healthy and wholesome meals into their lives. This will take time and preparation; however, it will provide you with the peace of knowing your family is eating nourishing foods rather than too many processed foods.

Cooking home-cooked meals can also be a way to build your relationship with your family in the New Year. On each night of the week, rotate between your children to determine who will help you in the kitchen. Depending on their ages, you can give them different levels of responsibility. Including them in the meal preparation will help them get more excited about healthy eating and cooking meals with the family.

By starting this healthy habit now, you can help prevent your family from developing various health conditions, such as heart disease and diabetes. As your children continue to cultivate this healthy habit, they will be more prone to carry it with them when they leave for college and start their own independent life. Be creative as you cook healthy and nourishing meals with your family by looking for recipes online and in cookbooks.

Related: 10 Quick Dinners to Help You Eat Well as a Family

4. Encouragement and Promotion of a Healthy Body Image

Another healthy habit to cultivate in our family in the New Year is to encourage and promote a healthy body image. Children, preteens, and teenagers are susceptible to developing a negative body image and eating disorders. This is why parents need to model a healthy body image and build their children up. Instead of criticizing your children’s bodies or food choices, you need to promote balance and well-being.

One way we can do this is by making our compliments non-appearance-based. Rather than complimenting someone on their weight loss, we should compliment them on their kindness or empathy. If your children hear you compliment other people’s weight loss, they will automatically equate weight loss with something positive. It is vital for you to let go of any diet-culture teachings or praising of the “thin ideal” to help your children grow up with a healthy body image.

Another way you can do this is by breaking down any inner fat phobia in your own life. This can be difficult since most of us grew up at the prime time of “Weight Watchers,” “Special K,” and fad diets. However, we must unlearn the lies of diet culture if we are going to promote a healthy body image. Kids will grow and gain weight, but this is a normal part of growing up and going through puberty.

Instead of making weight gain a big deal, make it a neutral topic. If your child or teen comes to you and says they have gained weight, don’t say the generic phrase, “You’re not fat, you’re beautiful.” This will hurt them, and it could cause them to feel bad about themselves. Rather than saying this hurtful phrase, choose to say, “Gaining weight is part of growing up. There is nothing wrong with gaining weight. It is healthy.”

Keeping the topic neutral will help your children move past any negative feelings they may have about their own bodies. It will also help if you enlist the aid of your spouse. Make sure your spouse doesn’t say anything upsetting about your children’s weight or body size, either. Both moms and dads need to be intentional in their words and actions to best help their children develop a healthy body image.

5. Helping Our Children to Build a Positive Self-Image

Similar to a healthy body image, we also have the privilege of helping our children develop the healthy habit of a positive self-image. If your children develop a positive self-image, they will be equipped with confidence in themselves. Instead of being nervous or self-conscious, they will be confident in the person God created them to be. God made your children fearfully and wonderfully (Psalm 139:13-14), and it is important to teach your children this beautiful truth.

Building a positive self-image cannot be done overnight. It will take many years to instill self-esteem in your children and ensure they grow up with a healthy self-view. If you are unsure where to start, a few ways to build a positive self-image for your children are to be proud of them, celebrate their achievements, and avoid being too hard on them when they struggle with something, such as their mental health, schooling, or grades. Help them to know that their worth is found in Christ alone, not in the things of this world (Colossians 2:9-10).

Cultivating a healthy self-image for your children will ensure they grow up to be happy and healthy adults. Read up on developing a positive self-image and look up resources that can help you achieve this goal for your children. Each day, do something to build up your children’s self-image. This could be telling them you appreciate their help setting the table, you are proud of them for trying their best, or to tell them that it is okay to mess up—we all do sometimes.

Once again, it is essential to neutralize anything that could be perceived as “negative” or “bad,” such as failing a math test, not making the soccer team, or having a difficult time fitting in at school. Avoid making the issue about your children and start helping them understand the perspective of others, that the world is full of sin, and that sometimes we will mess up even if we try our hardest. Encourage your children, be there for them, and do not embitter them.

As Paul says, “Parents, don't be hard on your children. Raise them properly. Teach them and instruct them about the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4, Contemporary English Version). Point your children to Jesus this New Year through your words, actions, and choices. When you begin to struggle, go to the Lord in prayer and ask for His strength.