Self-management means taking as much control as you can of your health care and health behaviors. Like people who run a business or take care of a family, self-managers need to be organized. They need a set of useful skills and habits, and they need support. This section will help you get started.

There are four basic strategies to self-management. They can be applied to anything you want to accomplish – from healthier eating to finding a better job. You can find strategies and skills for getting started with self-management by clicking on the pages listed in the left-hand column. Or you can continue reading to review the information in this section.

Goal Setting. Most people do better with self-management if they have positive goals to motivate them, ways they want their lives and health to improve. Change is hard, and we need reasons to do it. Goals can be about physical fitness, like walking a certain distance, or they could be about your life, like going back to school or being able to play with your dog. They can be anything you want. Read more.  

Action Planning. Breaking large goals into achievable chunks that we feel confident about is a great strategy for success. Action planning identifies small, specific steps toward larger goals, and strategies to succeed at those steps. The key is to make the plans specific - what, when, where, with whom, how often. Read more. 

Tracking Changes. If you’re trying to make a change in your life, how will you know when you have done it? We tend to forget what we have done or how we have changed over time. How do we remember the way things used to be? It helps to keep a record of your activities. These records (or logs) will help you see what’s working and what’s getting in your way. Read more. 

Problem-Solving. Life has a way of interfering with self-management. Usually people encounter some barriers they didn’t expect when they made their plans. Some basic steps to overcome problems have been studied and verified by social scientists and therapists over the years. You can use these steps to tackle any barrier. Read more. 

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