Once you’ve made a decision, with a clear commitment to change, you will do it. It’s easier if you have a clear target and a path to get there and beyond.
Then you no longer need to read up on it, have people help you or go on courses. Your determination will be a very powerful force.
You may still want some help to maintain your discipline but it will be help, not a crutch.
Make the decision. Commit. Win!
You need to adjust when life changes. If you get a diagnosis, your body changes, or there are external factors, you will need to change the way you do things.
You may have to change your diet, medical interventions, pills, exercise, route to work or your whole life!
Regardless, we are adaptable if we want to be. And we will survive. So start adjusting.
Then you can change the world. If we all tried to be better people individually, we would be better as a group through natural consequence.
If you’re trying to change someone, you’re unlikely to do it. Only the subject person will make the change happen. Berating someone or belittling them won’t do it. It often has the opposite effect. You can lead a horse to water…. Even make it look nice and dress it up. But you can’t force someone, or a horse, to take a sip.
Change yourself first. And if you have time left on the clock, then help others. Rather than force them.
Shake things up a bit. Adjust your sleep habits, tv and social media habits or even how much ‘news’ you read or watch. You can stop filling your fridge and cupboard with foods that do you no good. Get those things out of your environment. Less temptation or risk will help improve choices and results. You’re the adult. You buy the groceries. These changes start in the shops.
Go exercise this morning. Walk. Do 4 pushups. Start. Try. Experiment. Do a tiny shift. Or you can make big changes.
How soon do you want to see results? How long till you make the changes required? What age will you be when you finally make the changes you know you should have made 3 years ago?
Make changes. #letsgo!
A lottery win, new contract, new partner or a promotion can be wonderful. Especially if they were unexpected. Life changes fast. Sometimes it changes for the better and sometimes for the worse. I guess that is the reason for the marriage vows being written that way.
We all hope for the good kind of life changes. Although the other kind show up sometimes too. We need the resilience to deal with those.
Whether it is one of those Friday afternoon meetings which ends with your job gone or simply an unexpected injury, its rarely pleasant. We want to get through this pain point as quickly as possible and have everything running smoothly again. However, with most of these events, it does take some time, and work, to improve on the situation.
Amazingly though, life can turn on a dime and you can be moving forward again. I wish this for you. I hope your troubles are few and you manage them with personal strength. Hopefully you get more of the good changes and can let go of the other kind.
Moments are the creator of our destiny. Those moments will stay with you. They are usually easy to spot if you reflect a little.
Life changes fast. Roll with the punches.
There is something that you have been putting off. You know you want the outcome but something holds you back. Change it today.
Get your own attention and focus on the matter. Break it down into tiny steps. You do not need to live like this anymore. There is an alternative. So find that other path, get better people around you and thrive.
It could be that the hardest part of changing something is the people you can’t bring with you. You would like them to come with you. However they do not see your future in their future. And that is fine. But do not let it slow you down or stop you.
You must barrel along as if your destiny depended on it. Is the path you are heading along really leading you to the place you want to end up? What will your life look like in 20 years if you do not switch tracks? Is it really the life you want? Because you can change the track you are on.
You can make a hard turn or you can adjust slowly. Both can work. But you need to be sufficiently comfortable with the initial discomfort. Then it will continue to be uncomfortable until your mind can adjust and feel fine with it.
Make the decision you need to make right now.
Change it today.
Conscious changes can be difficult to make. Not all of them of course. But making adjustments in our life can be quite difficult and mentally challenging.
A few examples of things many people try to do, and often struggle with and stop are, losing weight, quitting smoking, drinking less, waking up early, meditating, exercising, saving and finding a better job. There is a formula for each one of these, though few people want to follow it.
Often people want to do it their own way. Or they will adjust the body and not the mind. You can simply quit smoking, but if you still see yourself (your self image) as a smoker, you are very likely to pick up the habit again.
Changes that happen naturally are sometimes easier to accept. Examples are growing up, ageing and progressing through primary school. So try to make things happen naturally or set up your environment so it feels natural.
Remember to modify your self image so you can accept the changes before or while they are happening. For example, immerse yourself in the daily thought that you are an early morning person and soon you will find waking up early is a breeze. Set up your environment to assist with this with a good wake up system and earlier bedtime.
Making adjustments in our life is worthwhile and easier than we want to acknowledge.
Learning something is good. Being able to convey that knowledge to someone else is brilliant. Learning while teaching a skill or subject is possibly the highest form of engaged interaction.
I’ve heard good teachers, speakers and sports personalities refer to how much they learn while sharing their knowledge or skill. It is an interesting aspect of life. By giving someone the benefit of our experience, knowledge or skill, not only will they gain, but we gain as well.
However, we may only gain if we are paying attention and open to learning. If we assume we are only providing information, we may miss the opportunity to receive feedback loops of learning.
It takes a certain skill to transfer knowledge from yourself to someone else. Not everyone is good at it, though it can be learned. Though while you are transferring that knowledge, you can also reassess how you learned, understood or integrated that knowledge. During this process, you may look at things in a new light. Perhaps new experiences, thoughts or information will impact your perception and adjust your mindset.
Although it can be quite difficult to be confronted with new points of view, it is beneficial to grasp those moments. If there was only one best way and one right answer, we would all know it by now.
Learning while teaching is a worthwhile skill to develop.
Common phrases like, “I keep trying”, “I can’t lose weight”, and “I’m not good enough”, hold people back. In part, this is why it is so hard to change.
When you want to change something in your life, you need to move from uncomfortable to unstoppable as quickly as you can. Part of the problem is wanting to have different results without doing things differently. Improvement usually requires a change in thoughts and actions. And these tend to make us uncomfortable, so we stop.
Think of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. It doesn’t stick a couple of wings on and fly off. It fully commits to its transformation. The caterpillar has to leave its old life behind to emerge into its new life. It is still the same ‘me’ once it is a butterfly. Though it is a different ‘me’ from before.
The butterfly has shifted from a creepy crawler to a beautiful, slim, flying machine. That is the power of the growth mindset – the will to grow into something magical and willing to leave their old life behind, never to return to it. I know it is uncomfortable at first when going through any change. However, as you shift your mindset and your body, the sooner you will be transformed.
Allow yourself to leave the the old you behind. Commit to the new you and fully embrace it.
Eliminate the number one reason why it is so hard to change.
The Mayflower took 66 days to cross the Atlantic Ocean in the autumn of 1620. Concorde took only 2 hours and 52 minutes to cross. Has life become too easy?
On the Mayflower there were about 30 crew and 102 passengers. You could fit about the same number of people on Concorde.
The ship was challenged by rough seas and difficult winds. The passengers spent most of those two months seated and seasick. One person was washed overboard. Hard to imagine what the dining service was like.
Meanwhile, the Mach 2 turbojet-powered supersonic passenger airliner had seatbelts, champagne and a very good reputation.
Also, in the Mayflower era, it took about 3 months to get a message to a transatlantic loved one. Today, you can simply FaceTime, Zoom or Skype them. With these video calling options, people can actually speak to, see and hear their dear friends and family in real time. Amazing!
There is so much efficiency and so little effort required today. This may be getting our expectations way ahead of our realty. This creates the ER Gap. This can be quite a dangerous place. It can even bring with it various mental health challenges.
Has life become too easy? Perhaps for many it has.
