Resolution to Fail, Committed to Succeed

The New Year is here, and just in case, anyone reading this has been living in a cave, this when everyone makes their resolutions for to ensure that 2017 is better than 2016.  Exciting right?  A fresh start to getting a jump on making life better, ready, set, go!  And if you are like most people, off you go with great energy and enthusiasm, only to fall of the wagon and quit in frustration.  It happens all the time, every year to almost everyone in some form or another.  If you are like most people who make a resolution, improving your health in some form is a part of the resolution platform, and so, every January thousands of people burst into the local fitness club or gyms with a resolution.  By mid-March the majority of these people have disappeared.

The Webster’s dictionary defines resolution, a noun, as 1: the act of resolving: as the act of analyzing a complex notion into simpler ones, 2: the act of answering and, 3: the act of determining.  I think of it more simply: identifying.   So if a person has made a resolution, congratulations, the problem has been identified…now, what will you do about it?

Here in lies the problem, this second question: ‘what will you do about it’, is never fully addressed, if addressed at all.  The next step is to commit.  As everyone knows, to commit is harder because commitment requires something that a resolution does not: action.  The dictionary defines commit as: 2: to carry into action deliberately or 3b: to pledge or assign to some particular course or use.  To commit is to engage in deliberate and purposeful action.  Living life as a verb instead of a noun is a distinction few people make.  Frankly, I think it why few people achieve their dreams.  It is why few people survive the resolution stage of health and exercise.  The word commit has another definition; it involves a jacket, men dressed in white, and a room with padded walls.

Want to know the secret to avoid becoming a ‘resolutioner,’as I like to call them?  Become so passionate about your health that the resolutioners think that that last definition of commit is your new home address.   Those who are full of passion in the pursuit of goals will never be understood by those who have none.  But passion driven without proper guidance is a reckless course to failure. Resolutions are made by those who wish to feel as if they accomplishing something, but in reality, have no idea to make it happen.

Without a plan, those resolutions are doomed to failure. However, those who plan for success find it. Those who commit and are fueled by passion and driving with a developed plan will find the success they crave. Luck is not needed; just solid commitment to a workable plan. Get after it! There is one key that must then be mastered. It is the most important key to succeeding with any exercise program. It has nothing to do with a particular exercise or cookie cutter program. What is this? Consistency. Whatever you choose to do, how often, when, or where is not nearly as important as doing to consistently. 

Nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight.-Bruce Cockburn "Lover's in a Dangerous Time"