CAREERS
NEW YEAR, OLD YOU
It’s the beginning of a new year: the time for ambitious new year’s resolutions and another opportunity to finally turn ourselves into new, improved, bigger, better, leaner and meaner versions of our- selves.
Or at least that’s what we are led to believe. The reality we all know is a little different.
Around the middle of January, most of us who firmly commit to one or several self-improvement projects on New Year’s Day have started to fall off the wagon. Come February, most resolu- tions will have been quietly cast aside and we will have returned to being our familiar old selves. Until the next year.
I have not made any New Year’s resolutions for years. The sym- bolism of January 1st has always been a bit lost on me. Don’t get me wrong, I am a big fan of personal and professional develop- ment, of having clear goals, planning for success and following through step by step. And as a coach, it is my job to help others successfully do the same. But the belief that somehow, simply be- cause we have turned a calendar page and write another year, we can become a better person overnight and magically stick to all those wonderful new habits that we have been struggling with for so long, seems rather unlikely and is bound to end in disappoint- ment.
So how can we implement changes in our lives in a more meaningful and sustainable way?
First of all, by acknowledging that change is uncomfortable and hard work and that humans by nature aren’t particularly good at it. Have you ever tried putting your watch on the opposite arm? Even the tiniest and most insignificant change can feel a lit- tle discombobulating. Try it, you’ll see what I mean.
Now imagine what this means for bigger changes that require serious effort!
Change is easier when it is linked to our long-term vision of success Seneca once said, “If one doesn’t know what port one is sailing to no wind is favourable”.
Sticking with the hard work and overcoming set-backs and peri- ods of discomfort is easier when the change is directly linked to a bigger goal that is meaningful, inspiring and important to us and that’s in line with our long-term vision of our future. Or in other words, we must have an idea of what port we are head- ing for (and why) to have the stamina and energy to work through the stormy times when winds are trying to blow us off course.
“I have not made any New Year’s resolutions for years.” 22 FOCUS The Magazine January/February 2019
www.focus-info.org
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