Why I Won’t Resolve (any different) for 2016
It’s a common theme this time of year for most around the world to hope for new beginnings, aspire to get their life on track, change their habits-like diet and exercise, and find the love of their lives. Yet all this so called change, year after year may leave you wondering why so many never reach their oh-so desired New Year’s Resolutions.
When you consider what this entails, it usually includes several basic steps. Typically people start out by taking stock of their current situation. I’ll call this step:
- Inventory. One generally assesses their situation, dreams, goals and current accomplishments. They get a general feeling of where they are at, whether or not they feel accomplished, and how comfortable they are or not with their legacy.
The next step that may happen can even be subconscious. One will often attribute a feeling to their current level of existence. Let’s call this:
2. Attribute. Although there may be a range of feelings one may feel at any given moment, it’s often said that there are only a handful of core emotions that we utilize on a daily basis. Let’s keep it simple by saying you either feel good or bad, outstanding or depressed.
Lastly, a decision must be made. While you may not look at your life,and your habits as cut off from anything or anyone, the root of the word decision means to “cut off.” The real core of the “resolution” process tends to be deciding to cut off some habits, behaviors, relationships or the likes in a hope to reverse engineer your desired end result, so this time next year you’re doing perceivably better than you are now. So let’s call this
3. The Cut Off. It is most often this time of the year that most people decide to cut off their perceived bad habits, relationships and even mindsets, in the hopes of bettering themselves. This makes me think however, how can something that’s so good, so much for the betterment of self, only be looked at once per year?
To recap, when we observe the simplicity of these three steps designed to reverse engineer their ideal life, we see the following:
3. People want to cut off (and out) of their lives the part(s) of themselves (traits, habits) or their environment (relationships, etc) they perceive are not working or serving their best, highest self and interest.
2. People generally want to feel good about who they are and what their doing in the world-let’s call this purpose. When you’re On Purpose, you feel good because you’re doing what you came here for.
- When taking inventory, people want to observe a life that they’re proud of, that resembles the captive image of their best selves, and feel a generally good feeling about themselves.
All this put together makes for a simple yet verifiably almost unattainable goals for the masses of people out there….
Why is that?
I believe firmly that anything that’s worth doing is worth doing more than once per year. By committing to personal dev, and CANI as Tony Robbins calls it-Constant and Never Ending Improvement, one can avoid the pitfalls of New Years Resolutions, and ultimatley live a life On Purpose, ever moving towards their optimal state of well being.
The bottom line is this-when you wait any length of time, in this case the popularized 12 months until “New Year’s Resolution” time you’re effectively defeating yourself before you even start. If you have something to accomplish, that’s of value, you’d practice it daily, even weekly or monthly, not once a year. The force of habit determines largely how you feel about yourself and how much you value yourself. Commit to something, see it through and watch your confidence soar. Commit to something only to falter, and watch your confidence dip.
Today, this year, and forever more, explore what it’s like to resolve to improve daily, and live a life committed to never ending improvement. This doesn’t mean anything other than the meaning you give it.
Happy New Year,
Jason Worrall
Dr. Jason Worrall is an inspired speaker, healer and teacher with a thriving practice in Los Angeles. He is known for both being a wellness expert and inspiring the masses to live their lives on purpose-inner directed and inspired. For more training, he runs an online coaching portal, PurposeRocks.