NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION PARADOX

Right now, as you read this sentence, there is a very subtle yet persistent voice in your head that is making you feel guilty for completely bagging your New Year’s Resolutions.

For about 40% of you, the New Year’s Resolution that you are at this moment breaking is about losing weight.

You’ve tried a lot.

You tried Paleo, went vegetarian, then vegan, then Atkins, and ate nothing but grapefruit for an entire week.

You’ve counted calories, reduced fat, supplemented with hemp protein, put coconut oil and butter in your coffee and pretended that it was okay to drink butter and oil if you called it “bulletproof.”

You’ve cut out fats and added fish oil, blended kale shakes with chia seeds and brazil nuts, followed the Zone, ate South Beach, fasted for 48 hours, almost passed out, prayed at a zen monastery, counted macrobiotics, declared that you only consume raw foods, researched Okinawan traditional diets, home brewed kombucha, got a dog for the exercise, asked the barista at Starbucks if they have almond milk, substituted agave for sugar, gave up Diet Coke, grew stevia in your garden, ordered frozen acai online, supplemented with probiotics and digestive enzymes, and read The China Study three times.

You’ve tried a lot, what’s not working?

There is a concept, very American I think, that everything can be accomplished if one’s will is strong enough.  This is evidenced by familiar quotes like:

“Where there’s a will there’s a way!”

I don’t buy it.

If we could accomplish whatever we wanted through strong will, none of us would have any bad habits.  We would, through sheer willpower, put down all our bad habits, pick up only good ones, and live life like an arrow shooting straight towards the target.

But we all have bad habits, don’t we.

Strong will to change isn’t enough.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m positive that there is a way through this.

And your way through this is not the same as my way through this, and in fact it’s not the same as anyone’s way through this.  The way through this for you, is the right way through this for you.

Easier said than done, and you could probably use some help.  That’s my job as a coach, helping you find your way.  Not my way. Not the atkinswaysouthbeachwaybulletproofway.

Your way.

A personal anecdote.

A couple years back I wrote a book on sales while holding a full-time job that didn’t leave me much free time.  It took me 2 years to finish the book.  Getting up at 5am to write a few pages before work got tiresome after about a year.

So at the 1 year mark, when I had the book 80% done, I lost the stamina to finish it and ended up letting it sit for about 6 months.  Life went on.

Then I hired a coach.  And 2 weeks later the book was done.

Here’s what happened.

During a coaching session I explained my dilemma to my coach Margaret, and after my long and excuse-ridden explanation I asked her, “So, hearing all that why do you think I haven’t been able to finish it?”

Margaret is a very good coach. She proceeded to list out 19 possible reasons why I might not have finished the book.  And then she says this for reason 20.

“Or Brian, you might just be lazy.”

Sublime in its elegance.  That was all I needed.  I was so outrageously pissed off at the suggestion that I might be lazy that it lit a fire in me to finish it just to prove her wrong.

Again, this is my way and is telling about me.  It certainly might not be, probably won’t be, your way.

There’s a way for you though.  I’m sure of it.

There’s something else that I’m sure of.

It’s a huge mistake thinking that your life, right now, is what your life will always be.

Here’s to a powerful 2016.