How to Give “Habit Change” a Chance?

Did you ever try to change a habit? How easy or hard was it? How did you handle it? Did you give up or did you persist until you succeeded? At this time of year, many people craft New Year’s resolutions while many others decide they don’t work, so why bother?

Unfortunately, spending time, money and energy to change habits
is not necessarily the first thing to do to be successful.

Investigating why resolutions don’t work is the first action step if you truly want results. The solution lies in reframing your understanding of your challenge. You do this by discovering where you stand, by uncovering what’s in the way, and by recovering increased integrated functioning on a mind, body, heart, and soul level. As a result, you are able to enlist the cooperation of all of who you are in manifesting your new behavior.

Below, I am elaborating on this process and also sharing a proven fact that makes people who would normally go back to their harmful habits stick to their decision and thrive.

DISCOVER:
Ask yourself if you truly want that change? Are most of your inner parts on board, or does your mind say it would be a good idea while other parts of you disagree? Maybe they are not ready, or don’t know how to make it happen. Being clear on this is crucial for success. Unattended beliefs and underlying habits can be a huge obstacle to realizing the best of intentions. Yet it’s easy to think we can’t do it because it’s too hard and leave it at that. With deeper understanding comes cooperation and determination supporting your decision.

UNCOVER
Once you know that most parts of you truly want that change, you can ask yourself what are the parts of you that are interfering with your success? Fear of failure? Fear of success? Elaborate on these fears trying to go to the most underlying belief. If you are not used to working with your inner parts, you may want to educate yourself about this work called Internal Family System or IFS. But essentially, keep questioning until there are no more possible answers. For instance: Why do I fear failure? Am I afraid it will show that I am not good enough? Why is not being good enough worrisome to you? I am afraid I won’t be lovable. Is that the truth, the whole truth that I am not good enough and not lovable? Etc… Questioning these beliefs is how you get to the truth of what’s bothering you.

RECOVER
Let’s say you resonated with “I am not good enough”, then simply reframe your belief into “I am good enough”, “lovable enough”, “attractive enough” or whatever the beliefs associated to not good enough are. You do not need to believe it at first for it to work. As an act of self-care, choose to hold this new belief in your mind and heart like an echo resonating throughout your being. See how it changes your mood and behavior for the better. The secret being to allow your inner parts to work more harmoniously together so they can cooperate when you engage them into changing a habit. After you become aware of the belief that was holding you back, starting on a positive note comes next to create a new neural pathway.

“Change or Die”
An inspiring book by Alan Deutschman
And the final touch to your habit change success!

Lastly, in his book, Alan shares case studies showing the power of support in people who normally don’t change their behavior even if it means loosing their life or freedom. It shows that attempting behavior change is a lot easier when you enlist support to be accountable to, be it a like-minded group of friends, like-minded community, or a teacher/therapist . Somehow, it seems we can be more accountable to ourselves when accountable to others as well.

“A journey of a thousands miles starts with a single step! ”
– LAO TZU –

CONCLUSION
Whether you try to change a movement pattern or a behavior pattern, discovering where you stand is the first step if you are to reach sustainable results. Since you can’t change a behavior with components you are not aware of, uncovering the underlying habits that are feeding your challenges comes next. Lastly, to assist the recovery process, find a support system for greater accountability.

As you start your journey into integrated functioning, changing your habits become increasingly easier and lead you to embrace the behavior you’re after while recovering the well-being you want and deserve.

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For more information on working with Cécile, upcoming events or if you have questions, respond to this blog or go to: https://cecileraynor.com/ where you can also sign up for a free consult if interested in exploring this work for increased wellbeing.