The missing piece of habit change
Happy New Year!
If you are a resolution-setting person, you’ve probably already created some intentions for the new year. As we know, the failure rate for New Year’s resolutions is reportedly somewhere between 50-70%. Those aren’t very good odds.
Because the odds are against us — even with our best intentions for eating better, exercising more, kicking that bad habit — I wanted to talk about an essential piece of change making that usually gets overlooked.
Any goal, intention or resolution (call it what you want) that you set won’t happen if you try to do it as the person you are today. As business coach James Wedmore says, “You'll need to become someone you’ve never been to create something you’ve never created.“
If your desired habit change is at odds with your identity, it won’t stick.
For example, let’s say you want to start running. (I don’t know why you would want to do that, because I find running dreadful. But I love you for it — go get 'em.) So you want to start running, but you don’t see yourself as a runner. You’re a non-runner who is going to go for a run.
You can buy the shoes, the special running tights, the step counter, but if these are just decorations on your past self-concept (as someone who doesn’t run), it decreases your odds of successfully building the habit of running.
Conversely, if you start to see yourself as a runner - as someone who runs - that identity shift will help you gradually become that person.
I like to work with the phrase, “I am a person who….“
I am a person who runs.
I am a person who eats leafy greens every day.
I am a person who listens well.
You can also make these statements more direct, like I am a runner, I eat leafy greens every day, I am a good listener.
There's something about seeing myself “as a person who“ that helps me live my way into this new identity. Do what works for you.
It may feel fake or at least mildly untrue at first, so stick with it and see what happens. (What do you have to lose?)
The beauty is this new identity becomes a gate or lens through which you approach other parts of your life:
How would a person who runs eat, move, think, spent their time? What would a person who runs do right now?
If you dig this and/or you love year-end reflections and new year dreaming, download my 2021 Intention Workbook. This was part of a special video lesson I made for Remembership subscribers, and it got such good reviews, I wanted to share the workbook with you.
I love annual markers of all kinds – special dates, birthdays, seasonal transitions, and yes, even New Year’s – as a way to create anchors and thresholds in my life.
Even though nothing really changed for us at 12:01 AM January 1, we can see this turn of the page as an invitation to pause and integrate what we’ve learned, as well as let ourselves dream a generous, loving and kind future.
Do you have any intentions for this year? Or maybe for the winter season? Download the workbook. Try shifting your self-concept to match your desired habit and see what happens. Let me know how it goes!
Michelle Marlahan
Where Self Care becomes Soul Care
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