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December 30, 2005
Got A Resolution Yet?
I've been talking about resolutions as if they were new learning opportunties because that's exactly what they are. If you are making a resolution to do something different, you're telling your head, body, and everyone around you "I'm learning how to do something new, something I haven't done before." Putting it in another light, if you already knew how to diet, stop smoking, quit procrastinating or whatever your issue is and what your doing worked for you, you'd be doing it. If you need a resolution then what you're doing probably isn't working and you want to change it.
Let's take a look at what I'm suggesting. I need to exercise. Every book tells me I should. My doctor suggestions it nicely and not so nicely. Ads on TV and in magazines tell me to buy this or that miracle solution to getting my body in shape. My head tells me I should exercise, but when it comes right down to it, I don't.
Oh, I have lots of reasons why I don't, but the bottom line is, I don't. Now if my resolution this year is to exercise, I am not going to be able to use any of my past learning to make that happen. If I could have done that before, I would be exercising today.
Let me give you examples of my past learning when it comes to exercise:
Swimming as a child-did well until swimming instructor had me swim the length of the pool and I nearly drowned-learned not to swim
5th grade volleyball-couldn’t figure out how to get under the ball-ended up on the sidelines-don’t play volleyball
8th grade physical fitness-failed the situps portion of the test-know I can’t do situps
High school tennis-nearly hit the teacher with an errant ball and she nearly took my head off-don’t play tennis
Gee, do you suppose what I learned was detrimental to skills and enjoyment of exercise today? One would think. So everytime I think about trying a new exercise, I drown or hear the PE teacher telling me how awfull I am at anything physical.
If this sounds familiar, it may be because you recognize as you look at making the same resolution for the 15th year in a row, that there may be some background behind why you have such a struggle doing whatever it is you resolve to do. With all those negatives going on in your head, why bother? Why resolve to do it in the first place? You can't get over these.
Actually there are some things you can do to help yourself and it doesn't involve taking up field hockey just because it's an area where you have no past history. It does require thinking differently. It requires thinking in a different way than you have been thinking in the past.
If you're interested in learning how to do that and a way to actually keep a resolution you make, come back tomorrow. It will be New Year's Eve and what better way to start your New Year than by optimistically looking at those resolutions that have haunted you for years.
See you tomorrow.
Posted by Dr Joni at December 30, 2005 08:27 AM