Why do New Year’s Resolutions Fail?

Our problem in keeping our New Year’s Resolutions . . . 

If you have ever made New Year’s Resolutions then you also know the frustration and discouragement of not living up to them.

Maybe you abandoned the whole habit of making them at all because of this frustration and discouragement. After all who wants to cause oneself to feel the pain of failure?

What is behind all this? What is our problem in keeping up with any resolution we make, whether it is at New Year’s Eve or any other day?

And most of all, what can we do about it?

We find the key to this question in The-Language of The-HEART.

You see, New Year Resolutions, Affirmations, etc. all speak the Wrong-Language! They are “left-brain”, verbal, intellectual, conceptual, void of Real-Raw-Experience.

The-Language of The-HEART is your Native Language, which you spoke fluently a long time before you learned the verbal language.

The Language of The-HEART is the Language of Images, Feelings, Experience, and Meaning. This language is a billion times more powerful than words and definitions. The problem is that it has been hidden underneath the words we speak. So hidden that we forgot that it exists.

When you declare Affirmations or New-Year Resolutions that are not in agreement with Your-HEART, you are set up for failure. Your-HEART will simply not get along, because its desires are different.

Trust me, it is not a lack of willpower, your willpower resides in your HEART and it is very powerful.

Relearning the Language of The-HEART is the first thing that is required if we want to change anything in our lives!

Everything is based on the IMAGES in Our-HEART.

Every action we undertake has first been seen as an IMAGE-In-Action on our IMAGE-Maker. In fact if we can’t see it on our IMAGE-Maker we can’t do anything.

Any IMAGE that we keep long enough on the screen of our IMAGE-Maker will have a physiological expression by sending electrical and chemical signals to our bodies and call our bodies in action.

That is only part of the story. The next question is how does it become a habit, and part of our default programming?

The-IMAGES we will act upon are tied to a strong emotional response.

For example chocolate is tied to a feel-good-experience because My-HEART identifies eating chocolate with being together with people I love. As a child, chocolate was a special Sunday-Treat and it meant that everyone was home and it felt so special and good. So chocolate became a Trigger-IMAGE for Love, Belonging and Security. Chocolate became an Intrinsic-Part-of the-IMAGE.

The-HEART simply connects every aspect of an experience into One-Complex-Unity. That is how chocolate can even be perceived as a substitute for Love. There is nothing logical and reasonable about it, it is about Raw-HEART-Experience. Being in a similar situation triggers a desire for chocolate. My longing for Love can be interpreted as craving for chocolate. The-HEART makes a short-cut from Love to Chocolate. And there I go. The-Fractal is established.

A Habit is a Fractal being reinforced repeatedly into default programming.

The stronger the habit I have that I want to get rid of is tied to an emotional experience – rightly or wrongly – the harder it will be to change the habit.

Chocolate becomes a powerful IMAGE in My-HEART controlling my behavior. When I receive the command to ‘eat chocolate’ I will most likely obey. I might resist the command for a while, but not for long. Especially when I’m having a hard time and need some comfort.

I will fail in changing the habit as long as I do not change the IMAGE in My-HEART.

Guess what I have been eating while writing this???

The chocolate was already in my mouth before I realized that I simply acted upon the Chocolate-IMAGES projected in My-HEART . . . I even got out of my chair to get some without giving it one conscious thought . . .

I quit smoking over two decades ago when after a strong negative physical experience the IMAGE of smoking became repulsive to me and it lost its power over me. I have never had the desire since then. It had nothing to do with willpower. Stopping was easy because My-HEART didn’t want it anymore and never produced me one more Smoking-IMAGE to act on.

I do not necessarily need a powerful negative IMAGE overruling the previous powerful IMAGE in My-HEART.

There are other ways to do it, but to be successful all of them include “Changing the IMAGES In The-HEART.”

The best way of course is to prevent from such powerful IMAGES to get established in the first place, but after 20, 40, 60 years or more that is a little unrealistic.

The same principle is at work if we try to establish a new habit but fail. The reason for failure can be in not having a strong enough positive motivating IMAGE, or there is another competing strong negative IMAGE motivating us negatively to resist the new habit.

I have had a lifetime of resistance to sport. I could never really make myself stick to anything. About ten years ago I had a strong positive motivating IMAGE that made it easy and enjoyable for me to start a routine of walking and in the summer of swimming as well. Six years ago I even started to do Pilates and I still do.

Yes there are days and weeks I do none of them as “life” easily demands the time set apart for walking, or weather makes outdoor activity too unpleasant or even impossible. But the IMAGE in My-HEART is still there and I want to keep it vibrant so it will keep motivating me. That IMAGE makes it easy for me to return and pick up the desired routine. How amazing.

The-Language of The-HEART is IMAGES

Everything is based on the IMAGES in Our-HEART. 

Releasing The-LION is about Relearning The-Forgotten-Language of The-HEART.