Every year on New Year's Day there is a push to make New Year's Resolutions. As important as these decisions are in our personal lives, they are often made and within a week chalked up on the list of personal failures to plague us throughout the new year. If your 'New Millennium decisions' have already gone by the wayside, all is not lost. There are some lessons that can be learned from Alcoholics Anonymous that can help change failure to success!
Spell out your goals clearly. It often helps to write down your goals in specific terms with a specific time line. For example rather than 'exercise' write down 'week 1: walk for 30 minutes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 8AM'. You might consider putting additional behavioral goals or increments on a calendar and checking them off as you accomplish them. Give yourself a gold star for your accomplishments!
Have a support system. We all need encouragement and support from time to time. It is helpful to have one or two good friends who are truly supportive and not critical (your spouse may be one of these) that you can tell what you are doing and ask if you can contact them if you are tempted to break your resolution. When making this agreement be sure to tell them that their job isn't to keep tabs on you (you're responsible to do that for yourself) but to be there for you when you request help and to celebrate your successes with you. In some instances you may want to seek out a support group such as over-eaters anonymous or gamblers anonymous.
Keep a positive attitude, living one day at a time. It is important to know that lifestyle and habit change takes time and often practice. That is how we learn things, two steps forward, one step back, and start over again with perseverance. Studies have told us that it takes approximately 3 weeks of conscious effort to change a simple habit so any rewarding lifestyle change will benefit from conscious reminders, not from criticism (from either others or ourselves). Over the years I have worked with many people to quit smoking. Frequently a 2 pack-a-day smoker will return 3 days after their first session with me discouraged and feeling like a failure because they had given in to their habit and smoked two cigarettes the day before. Never mind the 118 they didn't smoke, they are upset with the two that they have! Guilt, in this instance, only increases the stress they feel and increases the likelihood of failure. Choose each moment of each day to maintain your focus on your goal.
Recognize that you don't have to go it alone. Perhaps the most powerful of all lessons of Alcoholics Anonymous are included in the '12 steps' and specifically in the first 3 steps. Thousands have changed one of the most debilitating habits by relying on God; admitting helplessness to change by themselves, recognizing that there is a 'power greater than ourselves that can restore us to sanity', and finally turning it over to Him. Good luck in meeting your goals this coming year!
