I used to smoke.
Not like two packs per day or anything, but enough that when I see a Parliament Light, unfortunately, I still have a small craving in the back of my mind.
Throughout the time that I smoked, I quit on several occasions. Each time I quit, I did it cold turkey. But there was one thing that I did that I think helped my success rate jumped immeasurably.
I set a date.
It was always something like the first of the month or a date where I liked the string of numbers. By setting a date, I now had something I could measure against. So leading up to that date, I could mentally prepare myself for the upcoming changes. Once I hit the date, I could begin seeing how far I could go, and generally my competitiveness allowed me to just keep going.
January 1
I think that’s one of the reasons why we all like the beginning of the year. The beginning of the year is always a fresh start. It’s the opportunity to start over and do the thing you know you should.
- It’s the motivation to start eating healthy again.
- It’s the motivation to stop and think and plan because the beginning of the year feels like a time to do that.
But starting and continuing require very different states of mind.
Resolute or Resolved?
A few years ago I decided that I was going to do a daily vlog. I kept it up for about 20 days.
Last year, I decided that I was going to implement the savers methodology from miracle mornings. I made it about 10 days.
This is part of the problem with resolutions as an idea. While the beginning of the year is a milestone time to make big changes (Resolutions), it is also doesn’t take long for that momentum to die out.
You might be resolute in making a change, but you aren’t necessarily resolved that it will happen. I believe that you become resolved when your resolutions are continually reinforced. You’re resolved when you don’t just do it the first time. Your resolved when you never stop until it is completed.
When I write my three words posts, they are not resolution so much as they are themes. The themes are easy to carry throughout the year whereas resolutions fade quickly. With themes, I just simply start again. It’s not as if when I break the theme temporarily I can’t just go back to it. Often with resolutions, many people stop once they’ve broken the streak of achieving an ambitious goal.
It’s why the gym is so empty in February.
What about March 3, May 10, or August 8 ?
If you really think about it, the beginning of the year is just as arbitrary a time as any other even though it somehow feels different. Could you harness that same motivation by just simply picking another date to (re)start throughout the year?
Whether you make resolutions or themes for this year, if you find yourself faltering at any point remind yourself that you can just pick a new date and start again because, really, January 1 is just an arbitrary date to start new habits.
Photo by Humphrey Muleba on Unsplash