Why you can’t find the answer you’re looking for or make that New Year’s Resolution stick
Are you using the post-Christmas lull to search for THE ANSWER to your…
excess weight
constant fatigue
anxiety
bad habits
lack of direction
knowing the changes you want to make but not being able to make anything stick?
Are you reading the countless articles and Facebook promises of a shiny New Year? Are they already sucking you in with their glossy photos and carefully chosen words that seem to describe how you’re feeling perfectly.
They promise they have THE ANSWER that you need. The one you’ve been looking for. And unless you pay them all of your money you will never know it. You will never be able to make the changes you want to make.
Are you already researching all of the hoops you’ll have to jump through to be who you think you want to be?
Have you already written your own list of commandments for the year?
Thou shall not let sugar pass thy lips.
Thou shall not have any more than 3 drinks at a time.
Thou shall exercise every day.
Thou shall not watch back to back episodes on Netflix.
All the while last year’s replica list sits forgotten in the place it was left January 3.
When it comes to goals there are usually three types of us.
Type 1.
Those of us who excitedly embrace the chance to dream and plan anew at the start of each year. These people are also strivers, always looking for new opportunities, always chasing those big dreams.
These days I proudly sit in this camp. I’ve looked back at last years goals regularly, and while I didn’t hit all of them, I’m pretty proud of how the year turned out on the whole. I haven’t always been here. I haven’t always embraced whatever part of me that is always refining, seeking, bettering (totally a word, yes?)
Type 2.
Those who pretend they ‘don’t believe in resolutions’, mainly because they feel like they’ve always failed at them before. And they can’t handle any more failure. While secretly they make private resolutions to be better, thinner, smarter, richer…
This used to be me. I would pretend I didn’t care. “How silly” I would say. “To be making resolutions, at one of time of the year?! They’ll only fail. I don’t buy into it.”
Meanwhile my mind would be thinking about how amazing I would be in the New Year.
Type 3.
Those who don’t plan or set goals. Ever.
If you’re either type 1 or 2, you might be starting to question why your resolutions never seem to ‘stick’. Why you’ve done everything, tried everything, read everything and STILL nothing seems to last longer than a couple of weeks.
It works for everyone else, why doesn’t it work for you?
Perhaps you’ve started to ask ‘what is wrong with me?’
Or maybe, you’ve already halfheartedly given up.
Maybe you’ve resigned yourself to being this way forever, but also secretly wishing someone would hand you the magic pill to solve all of your problems without having to do any of the hard stuff.
And by HARD STUFF, I don’t mean half-starving yourself to fit into your skinny jeans.
Or training so hard that you feel like your head is going to explode.
Or working so hard that you forget what fun feels like.
None of these things are the type of hard stuff that creates change.
The hard stuff is going within.
It’s standing still long enough that you can actually listen to what that little voice inside of you is saying, rather than simply going through the motions of playing all of the roles that are expected of you – daughter, mother, sister, wife, friend…
The hard stuff is quitting the endless distractions and actually dealing with how you are feeling, moment to moment.
It’s about having the difficult conversations that you’ve been avoiding (with others… and yourself).
The hard stuff is being brave enough to live your life the way you damn well please, rather than how everyone else thinks you should. (And not in a ‘damn you all kind of way’ but more of a ‘this is my truth and I need to live it’ kind of style).
To make the changes you want to make next year, you’re going to have to go deep enough to meet yourself where you are right now. You’ve got to get to the place where you can embrace and love who you meet there, even when it doesn’t look like the glossy magazine ideal you’ve created in your head.
That’s the hard stuff. Because we all want to put restrictions on ourselves. I’ll be happy when… I’ll accept myself when.. I’ll love myself when…
You’ve got to meet yourself where you are right now. The answers are not ‘out there’. When you get quiet enough to listen you’ll realise you had the ‘right’ answers all along, and you’ll wonder why you wasted so much time looking for them.
So if you’re wanting to make some big changes this New Year, can I suggest you simply stop. Stop looking, stop doing, stop distracting, stop pretending…
Start listening… YOU have the answer you’re looking for.