I’ve just had an epiphany as I drove home from my morning Prime Mover sessions, I thought to myself ‘one of my New Year’s Resolutions is to keep my car tidy’, but as quick as I’d thought it I realised that just saying the words is pretty pointless without any plan of action!
You see most New Year’s Resolutions are over with by the end of January because all that’s been done is saying the words ‘I will…..’, ‘I won’t…….’, ‘I’m giving up…….’, without really drilling down into ‘Why’ and ‘How’!
So for me the ‘How’ is keeping a bag in the car to throw my banana skins and water bottles in and then transferring that to my Wheelie Bin and replacing with a new bag every couple of days, the ‘Why’ is so that I don’t look like such a tramp when I give a lift to someone! And to give myself a better sense of organisation in my life.
For some people the ‘How’ could be:
* Make excuses for any social activities throughout January (or have the Will Power to resist the alcohol)
* Buddy up with a work colleague to help each other past the biscuit tin
* Sign up with a Personal Trainer (or Group PT centre!!!)
* Book a hypnotherapist to stop smoking
And here are some of the potential ‘Why’s’ for the above:
* To cleanse the Liver, clear your head and undoubtedly reduce your waistline
* To stop spiking your blood sugar throughout the day which is impeding your weight loss, and pushing you closer to Diabetes!
* Because exercise is essential and your knowledge of ‘what to do’ and ‘how to do it’ is limited at best, get a professional in! When the boiler in your house is broken you don’t try to fix it yourself, do you! Think about it!
* So you can stop burning cash, having to stand outside and reduce your risk of lung cancer!
The list goes on forever, everyone has their own reasons for changing but that’s the key, dig into the reason, if you want to lose weight, WHY? If you want to run a marathon, WHY? If you want to stop smoking, WHY?
Once you find the Why, the How will become clearer and the chances of your Resolution sticking will be much, much higher.
Paul Glazby