This week’s blog is part 5 of the 5-part series on permanent change
For the audio version of this blog, scroll to the end and press play.
I’d done it all. I’d worked through the lifestyle implications of the changes I want to make happen. I cleared out space for my new work. I believed it could be done, kinda. I was planning and doing, heading towards change when all of a sudden, it wasn’t in my frame of reference. I couldn’t see it and then I tripped.
This week, I was seriously trucking along. I was committing tasks to my calendar and executing them. I’d hit a major milestone on my side hustle and delivered results. At my day job, I was making progress on several fronts and I was keeping my health goals in line…I even got up early and went out for a run… in the dark… and yet…Boom!
A total eclipse of my plans.
A trainee showed up that I forgot was arriving. He smiled at me and I thought “Oh no! What am I going to give him to do?” I had to cancel a launch at my day job to allow for more testing and fixes. I fell behind on daily tasks for one of my side ventures. Then, I tossed all my health goals to the wind, plopped some cheese and crackers on a plate and went out to my porch, in 24-degree weather, to brood.
Stuff happened.
Stuff is always going to happen; it doesn’t mean we should go out on the porch and brood. If we do, it certainly doesn’t mean we should stay there. Especially if it’s dark and cold out.
The business of change is the business of renewal. Daily, weekly, any time.
Here’s the deal. All or nothing thinking is the enemy. At work, believing we know it all is the first step toward failure. When we think things are black and white, cut and dry, done and over, we lose. We don’t listen to other people’s ideas, we don’t try to think of improvements, we don’t run hard right up to the deadline. We give up, think small and don’t listen.
The same is true when we’re trying to change. If you indulge in all or nothing perspectives, you’re taking the easy way to failure.
Telling myself if I don’t do everything I planned, my plan is a failure, is ridiculous right? I’m being too hard on myself.
Or am I? I might be going easy.
It’s easy because I don’t have to sit down and evaluate where things went south and revise my plan. It’s easy because I don’t have to pick myself up and try again. It’s easy because I can just stop.
Too bad that’s not how we frame this type of quitting to ourselves. We don’t call ourselves out for this kind of cheating. Instead, we wallow a bit. I know I do. I feel like a failure, I ruminate on it, but I also give up. It feels bad, but it also feels like a bit of a relief.
The business of change is the business of renewal. Daily, weekly, any time, all the time.
So how are you doing on your goals? Did you set any for this year?
If you did, were you gung-ho for a bit?
How are you feeling now?
Or are you so gun-shy that you no longer set goals?
Here’s what I know:
You can always start over, every day and twice on Sundays.
If you shoot for the stars and hit Everest, heck, you hit Everest. Dude.
There’s more than one way to anywhere.
The business of change is the business of renewal – and revision.
Renew your commitment.
Revise your plan.
Do yourself the favor of seeing reframing and re-trying as the most compassionate things you can do for yourself. Because they are. There is no reason you have to take the best route to your dreams. Take any route, take all the routes. It’s a dream. It’s your inheritance as a human. A dream is a privilege.
The business of change is the business of renewal.
Whatever your dream is, whatever you want to achieve, don’t cancel it. Spend time with it. You were designed to go after it. It’s in your DNA.
If you would like to take the first step to permanent change, click here.
The business of change is the business of joy.
And that? Is something worth chasing.