New Year, New Me?

 

Here we are again, the start of a new year.  Happy New Year to you!

And once again, as old as time, we’ll all hear lots of new year, new me BS.

Then, without fail, somewhere between one week and two months, all that good intention will have evaporated into thin air, ready the be resurrected next January.

And you’ll have given up.

Relying on motivation

So what’s happening here?  And what isn’t happening that makes this go so predictably wrong?

It’s all due to reliance on motivation.

Let’s use the age-old “new year, new me diet” as an example.

You’ve spent two weeks eating your body weight in Terry’s chocolate orange and consumed more alcohol than George Best (ok, you probably ramped up to it for a few weeks/months before Christmas, spinning the line that “I’ll sort this out in January”).

Now it’s January, a self-certified state of a human and you’re fuelled with motivation to sort this out.

Cut out the booze, smash the salads, hit the gym (with all the other once-a-year types) – you’re fired up for this new life.

But here’s the thing…..you’re relying on motivation to get you to your goal.

Unfortunately, motivation comes and goes.

When you fail to see instant results, naturally, motivation falters.

And without motivation, you default back to the poor systems and habits that got you there in the first place.

Instead rely on discipline & consistency

The key to changing all of this is discipline and consistency.  It is these things that deliver results.

Do consistently what isn’t asked of you and what doesn’t need to be done right now but will help you in the long run.

Discipline and consistency rely on systems, processes and habits.  It also focuses on the longer term.

Motivation focuses on the short term.  It also relies on emotion and allowing emotion to dictate action is a dangerous tactic.

The gym analogy is transposable to your business life.

If you lack the systems to effect the change you need and without them, you will revert to doing things the way you always have.

We’ll be revisiting the systems you need in your business over the next few weeks but for now, you need to start with the mindset that change is possible.

“If you believe you can do something or believe you cannot, you’re probably right”

This is a tired and cliched trope but if you tell yourself limiting beliefs, you will make conscious and unconscious decisions that make that reality happen.

What to do differently?

So here’s the plan:

• Set a goal
• Stop telling yourself what can’t be done
• Ditch the reliance on motivation
• Put systems in place to encourage discipline and consistency
• Remove distractions
• Quit letting yourself off the hook
• Get to work

We’d encourage you to read back over our Atomic Habits blog from this time last year.

We’ve also written a follow on blog about systems and goal setting which can be found here.

You’re more capable than you think.

If you stop crippling your progress by telling yourself what can’t be done, you’ll be able to do far more than you think possible.