You’ve decided you want to change your life – that’s the first step complete. But it’s also arguably the easiest part – the challenge comes with sticking to your plans.
When undertaking any change, there are always going to be obstacles, whether these are outside circumstances, or internal wobbles like lapses in self belief or motivation.
No matter how well intentioned, setting lots of big goals at once is setting yourself up for failure. How many people decide on New Year’s Eve that they’ll suddenly start going to the gym every single day, even though they’ve not yet even set foot inside?
It is the small incremental changes, that are realistic to achieve, which will add up to the biggest changes.
The format of my book sets you up to truly commit to change, by undertaking one small activity each day. You can be flexible, swap days around, and make the tasks work for you – as long as you ultimately show up for yourself.
If there is one theme that connects every single activity in this book, it’s about making time for your life, and this takes commitment.
The ‘commitment’ activities in the book fall into two camps:
The first is making a commitment to yourself, that you’ll ride out any doubts and wobbles during this process. You may not see immediate results to your work, but you have to trust in the small changes, that will eventually amount to noticeable growth.
The second is a commitment to an ongoing process. The commit activities will provide tools and techniques to carry through your life, beyond the year contained in the book, for as long as you want to keep growing.
Have the Best Year of Your Life contains one commitment activity for each week of the year. Some stand alone, while others build on work undertaken earlier in the year.
Here are some of my favourites:
Make a vision board
Vision boards are another way of working with visualization and the law of attraction. You’re focusing your subconscious mind on moving you in the direct of your hopes and dreams.
There are many wonderful stories of how using a vision board has worked magic in people’s lives. I recently came across one I made more than a decade ago and was thrilled to realise that one of the largest pictures on it, of a lake with mountains behind, was the exact scene I’d recently visited with my sister.
Make a start on your own board, begin by collecting just a couple of images that represent what you want to create in your life.
Create the musical soundtrack to your life
In your journal, have fun identifying the musical soundtrack of your life: the top ten tunes that remind you of significant times or people, represent turning points, or that say something about who you were and who you are.
Write a few words about why each of those tunes has earned its place in the musical of your life.
Take a mental holiday
When you feel the need to relax but haven’t time for a walk, a useful technique to use is to go on a mental holiday.
Our bodies find it hard to distinguish between real events and those we recreate in our minds; so holding a memory of being relaxed in your mind will slow your heart rate and settle your mind.
Remember a time when you felt happy, relaxed and at peace.
Picture all the details in your mind as thoroughly as you can: what you could see, smell, taste, hear, touch, but above all how you felt.
Store that memory to return to whenever you need a moment’s breathing space.
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Have the Best Year of Your Life sets out seven key areas where your personal growth can take place, and where joy, discovery and change can enter your life.
Visit my Instagram and LinkedIn pages for more updates, and buy Have the Best Year of Your Life for an activity, challenge, or piece of growth work every day of the year.