Are you happy with your life right now? Chances are, there are areas of your life with which you are not happy. There is no one who can change that but you. Our routines are our biggest asset, and they can also be the very thing that keeps us living a life of existing and not thriving.
Have you ever asked yourself what you really want? What do you want your life to look like a year from now? What do you want your life to look like five years from now? We are our daily habits. That over-used phrase: “If you continue to do what you’ve always done, you’ll continue to get what you’ve always gotten”—is the hard truth.
I’m going to pose some tough questions. I hope you will really ponder these questions!
Is your spiritual life where you want it to be? Do you have a close relationship with the Lord? Are you attending church or watching it online? Or, is that something that’s even important to you? Why or why not?
How about your personal relationships. Are you married? How’s that relationship? Are you roommates, or are you intimate? Do you spend time together?
If you have kids, how’s your relationship with them? How’s that going? Your relationship with co-workers or friends, how are they going?
Let’s talk about our health. How do you feel about your fitness? When you look at your body, is it what you want or have you neglected that area? Are you eating healthy; are you moving your body? How do you feel about your health?
What about your home; where you live? Are you on top of that area of your life? Are you happy with the results? Are you satisfied with your present living conditions?
As I threw out all those areas, how are you feeling? Am I getting too personal? We’d all like to think that we’d wake up one day and that one area of our life that we are not happy with, fixed itself overnight. But when we get honest with ourselves, that area is usually one we neglected, ignoring it months or years ago. When, one day, one of the spouses say he or she wants a divorce, this didn’t didn’t just happen. If we’re honest, it was an accumulation of a lot of small decisions that were made. And overtime those decisions became our routines and habits. This is the fact: our routines and habits gave us the results we have right now. Good or bad. It’s a hard truth, but it’s the truth.
So, what’s the solution? As simple as it sounds, if we evaluate where we are and where we want to be and get really clear, we can change an area of our life. And just like we didn’t get the results we have overnight, the new results we want, will not happen overnight. The new routine and the new habits we create, and do consistently, will bring new results.
So, what is the area for you that you are most dissatisfied with? You get to decide. Is there an area that if you don’t decide to change it, it will continue to get worse and it will eventually get to the point the consequences are going to be so great that you can’t ignore it anymore? You will be forced to change in this area! It may not be at that point right now, but you know that day will come eventually, and if you’re being honest you, you know your area.
Is it your marriage? Is it that you’ve walked away from your faith? Is it your health? Your home? No one knows your life like you do. What is it? You know if my words are hitting your target right now.
Here’s what I want you to do. Get out that journal and write what you are thinking and feeling right now. I want you to write down that one area that you know needs focus. I want you to pray about this. Ask God to help you; to show you the area. Pray and ask God to bring people into your life that can come along side you to encourage you and help you.
Write in your journal all the ways your life will be better if this one area improves. Really expand on this and write down everything you can think of. Please describe the worst-case scenarios if this area does not improve. This is very important! What you are discovering is your “why!” People don’t change and put in the effort if there isn’t a big enough “why.”
Now, I want you to write an email to yourself. Write how you will feel a year from now if you have changed this area of your life. Write yourself a congratulations letter, that you got on top of this area. How you are proud of yourself that you made the small changes did them consistently, and your life is better because you decided, committed, and followed through. Describe the life you will be living because you created new habits which is now your routine. Be sure to also include how things will continue to get worse and the possible worst cast scenarios of where you are headed if you don’t change your habits in this area. Sign it. Email programs now have the capability of sending this letter to yourself six months from now and one year from now. I want you to email these two letters to yourself in the future. Complete this task. Trust me, this will change your future.
The next step, write out 5 simple things you can do to make progress in this area. I want you to pick one and write a date of when you are going to do this one thing. Now commit and do it for one week, then two. Add the 2nd simple thing. Action is key. Moving forward with doing the small thing and then adding the next small thing. What you are doing is adding small changes until these small changes become your new habits. We are the sum of small decisions. Those small decisions become habits, and those habits become routines.
If your life is going to change, 1st you must take responsibility for where you are and believe that you are responsible for the decisions you have made and for the decisions you will make moving forward. You must make intentional conscious decisions. You must take action and be good to your word to yourself. It’s all small steps that all add up. It’s not that complicated.
I started this post with: “The results you are getting is what you are putting your time attention and effort into.” This is a fact. So, if you want different results, the question is: Are you willing to put your attention and effort into the new results you want? It’s that simple. It’s up to you!
From personal experience, if I wanted a better marriage, I had to devote time attention and effort into my marriage. If I wanted to be healthier, I had to put the time attention and effort into that area. If I want to have a closer personal relationship with God, I had to put time attention and effort into that area. I started with one area at a time. Let me tell you, from the bottom of my heart this works. Things don’t change and get better if we don’t change and get better, it’s that simple.
So, what is it for you? Is there one glaring area of your life that is screaming for attention? You are the only person who knows what that is. I have been where you are and felt the same way until I got honest with myself and did the process that I just shared with you. Are you going to accept my challenge? Is there that one area in which you know your life would be better if you put the time attention and effort into it?
Monette hosts a weekly podcast: Mornings with Monette. She has been a lifelong learner and and appreciates the opportunity to share what she has learned–both through her podcast and here at The Best-Life Project (based on the content of her weekly podcast). Her messages are raw, honest and straight from the heart. She lives in Albuquerque, NM with her husband Leland. They have three adult children and are enjoying living their best lives filled with travel and adventure. For more information, visit: http://morningswithmonette.com/.