Most people make New Year’s resolutions every year and yet they’re rarely successful in following through with them.
The beginning of the New Year is symbolic of a fresh start and new beginnings. People are full of hope:
“This year I’ll be a better person.”
“This year I’ll lose weight.”
“This year I’ll balance work and my personal life.”
We make a series of resolutions to make our resolutions happen and we start with enthusiasm. A month later the enthusiasm wears off and we’re back to our old bad habits.
What happened?
People tend to change because they either want to avoid pain or get pleasure. A key to success is to make the pain of staying the same greater than the pain of procrastinating.
A friend of mine tried to give up smoking but was unsuccessful until he made a bet with a colleague who also wanted to give up smoking. The bet was that whoever was caught lighting up a cigarette had to pay the other one $500. The pain of paying $500 was greater than the pleasure of lighting up a cigarette; neither of them has smoked since.
A messy engineer who attended my seminar decided to have a clean desk. He told his team he would buy lunch for anyone catching him going home with a messy desk. After buying lunch for his associates for a few days, he decided it was less painful to clean his desk, and he has successfully developed a new habit of putting things away at the end of the day.
What changes do you want to make? What are you willing to pay to insure that you will change for the better?
Happy New Year from Peter “The TimeMan’ Turla.
You may use all or part of this time tips article as long as you credit the information to Peter Turla.