February and January are worlds apart. Here’s how to navigate the change.
So… February. How you doing?
I’m still working through the Hayne RC report. Explosive stuff.
I’ll give you the full wrap tomorrow… but for now, a question Josh Frydenberg must be asking himself: “Why is February such a brutal month?”
The year is well and truly underway now. But most people are still getting into it. Most people are still getting out of bed and putting the toast on. Most people are still reorganising the pens in the top drawer.
But not you, right?
You made a full-power start to the year. You used the clarity that comes with the start of the year to get real focus on your goals, to cement some awesome habits, and to double your commitment to doing the things that truly make you happy.
You did that right?
Don’t lie to me. You either did or you didn’t. Because most of you will be going, “Yeah yeah, goals, habits, joy… I’m all about those things. Sure. But you know, I don’t really need to write them down or anything. I don’t need to do the hard yards of building a habit, or commit to any sort of action at all actually… I’m special.”
Yeah, nah, you’re not special.
You are a meat-sack of laziness, vanity and inherited beliefs. We all are.
The only thing that can save you are your practices – the things you put into action. It is our practices that enable us to dig deep into the meat-sack of our own human condition and draw out the gems within – the things that truly make us special.
So don’t ‘yeah, yeah’ me, buddy. Just get it done. It’s February already, ffs.
Ok, but let’s assume you did make a full-power start to the year, for the sake of this blog.
Where are we at now?
We are in a very tricky phase – a phase that will derail many people.
In this phase we are like a rocket that has achieved escape velocity, but is still held by the earth’s gravitational pull.
We’ve done the hard work and brought ourselves up to speed. But now we need to sustain that speed until we are free – free from the old ways of being and the results that used to get us.
But sustaining momentum is hard. We’re not running a sprint anymore; we’re running a marathon. We don’t have the thrill and the challenge of starting something new. We have the drudgery and the pains in the shins that come with keeping something going.
It’s not a sexy phase. But it is vital. This is where victory is won.
Life will test your stamina. It will test your commitment. It will want to see how much you really want this.
We all need to figure out own strategies for getting through the sustaining phase.
But all I want to say is just recognise that this is just the next phase in things.
After the excitement of building something new, comes the drudgery of sustaining it.
And if you’re not feeling excited by it – if you’re not feeling like you’re in ‘alignment’ anymore and you’re wondering if maybe you were deluded for all of January, and maybe you should just scrap the goals, habits and practices you were building and start again…
… don’t.
Don’t do it. This is a natural phase. The fruits will come in time. Just keep pushing. Keep your head down. Keep moving forward.
Have faith in the targets you set yourself, and keep going.
The theme for February is ‘sustaining momentum’.
You can do it.