Most of us want to improve our lives continuously. We make new year’s resolutions … or every Sunday night, we are determined to “start fresh” Monday morning with whatever it is we are trying to change.
I can’t speak for everyone, but in my personal experience, change has to happen in increments, in steps. It is an ongoing event. Change is a present moment activity. It is happening now. Not tomorrow, not next week, not next year. So, the wonderful thing about that is, every single moment is a chance to change your life, to turn it all around. But it doesn’t need to be some profound action. It can be a baby step.
If you want to practice yoga everyday or meditate more or eat healthier or de-stress more often … those things don’t need to be huge undertakings.
One of the best pieces of advice someone gave me at a recent retreat, pick out a goal for yourself that is so easy, you would be embarrassed not doing it. For instance, if it’s to meditate daily, pick out two to five minutes a day to just sit quietly and meditate. ANYONE can find two to five minutes a day. Same thing with healthy eating, start with small things, like removing unhealthy foods in baby steps, be present and mindful when you eat and when you choose what you are going to eat. Really FEEL your body and what it’s truly needing, not so much craving, but needing. Be in touch with yourself always and your inner guidance will not steer you wrong.
If it’s exercising, start small, a 10-minute walk or brisk workout, then slowly increase it. We all tend to try to shoot for the stars when we want to make goals and we are just setting ourselves up for defeat. Yes, we’ll get to those stars, but we need to slowly ascend, we can’t fly before we walk, after all.
Also, we tend to be so hard on ourselves. I know I often used to make these grand promises to myself to change this or that and I would want to do it all at once. Now I’m enjoying the beauty of the journey and every little, sometimes seemingly trivial step along the way. Once you find true patience with yourself, you will notice you meet these changes with resistance less and less. In fact, you begin to crave the changes and they become an integral part of your lifestyle. It’s all about balance, breath, present-moment awareness and patience.
Whatever it is you’d like to change or accomplish, sit with yourself quietly, know yourself and your patterns and work WITH them to change. If you know you tend to start projects you never finish, try to keep things simple and just focus on one step of a project at a time. Be gentle with yourself. You know yourself better than anyone else. We can’t rewire our brains over night, so work with the wires. And if you have a few setbacks, just breathe and get right back at it.
After all, life is always keeping us on our toes … it wouldn’t be life otherwise <3
Be well friends …
~C~