Resolution: Evolution - Resolve to Evolve

Join me on my Journey – I am resolved to evolve

I’m middle class, bored and want more in my life. What about you are you ready for a change? Are you sick of wasting your life away? Come on then join me. I’d love to have some company along the way.  We’ll go for Gold on goal setting, shoot for real targets, measure our progress to pit stops , and celebrate arrival at our destination in 12 months’ time (hopefully without too many detours or toilet stops along the way). 

Read on ...

Are you like me - one of the 35% of the population who has continually broken your News Years Resolution before the end of January? Well, with the Chinese New Year fast approaching you have another chance to make a commitment (resolve) to make a change (evolve).  So pick yourself up, dust yourself off and join me on a self-coaching journey, where we will successfully complete at least one of our resolutions by the end of the year.

There is a well-known quote that goes something like: “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” and “that single first step” is what we are going to explore in this my first post.

 What is a resolution anyway? 

According to the dictionary it means:

1.      a firm decision to do or not to do something.

synonyms:

intention, resolve, decision, intent, aim, aspiration, design, purpose,object, plan;

2.      the action of solving a problem or contentious matter.

synonyms:

solution to, answer to, end to, explanation to

In  other words a plan to solve a problem.  

In the past, my resolution wish list has included any one or more of the following:

·         losing weight

·         exercising more

·         have more fun

·         giving up drinking and

·         being a better person. 

What have been your top 5 recurring wish list items?  

I say, wish list, because it involves wishy washy thinking or very little thinking at all.  Have you been caught in this same trap?   

Motivation

Before we jump head first into setting our goal let’s think about it for a while.

We might need to ask ourselves“What’s  the main reason we want to achieve whatever it is?”  In other words, what is our motivation?   Motivation is the combination of desire, values, and beliefs that drives you to take action.  The greater the value we place on something the more likely we are to do the work it takes to attain the goal.

Let’s stop for a moment and do some serious navel gazing (quiet reflection) so we can identify what our most important drivers.   I hear the groaning and moaning but as the saying goes “no pain, no gain”.    Besides its hard to navigate forward if you don't know where you're starting from.

 

Activity:

• 1.      Consider your current life (overview of last couple  of months). What is happening? Where is your focus? What were you doing? How do you feel? What values are your focused on? What things are you trying to balance? 
• 2.      Now recall (dare I say even draw it) a peak moment in your life and ask yourself the same questions. If you can't recall a moment then visualise a perfect day for you. Then ask yourself: What am I doing? what is good about it? what makes it outstanding? What are the values I am honoring? 
• 3.      Compare the lists
• 4.      Identify those ideal values you would like to move up on the priority list in your current life, and action steps to make it happen.

Example:  Fred Jones is a career accountant who has dedicated his time to getting ahead. He now feels that his life is out of balance and he decides he ideally wants Friends to come before Achievement in his life.  To achieve this outcome  he will have to make some significant changes in his current behavior to make this happen.

What Are Your Thoughts?

As always your thoughts and feedback are most welcome.

• What has your experience of resolution setting been?
• Did you find the exercise in this post useful? If not why not? 
• Can you offer fellow readers any additional advice?
• Are you pumped and excited ready to set some goals? or
• Have you already set goals for 2014?  Tell us about the process you followed.

One last thing.

Trying and failing isn't awesome. But it beats never trying and thus living with regret.

I'll be posting again next week with some navigational tips relevant to our road trip.