Every year we sit down and think about what our New Year’s resolution is going to be. And every year it mostly revolves one way or another to be something that changes us to make us better. We make resolutions that are anything from losing weight or quitting smoking to spending more time with our families or finding a new job. The problem is that most of us who make a resolution abandon it within the first three months. We tend to get distracted, lose focus or decide that it is just too hard to accomplish our goal. The latter tends to flow from a place where we are not confident in our abilities to get the goal accomplished.

Make a Pros and Cons list

Think for a minute about wanting to quit smoking. When you think about it, the first response you have is that you can do it. You make a list of things you can try whether it is quitting cold turkey, using the patches, exercise, online support groups, or going to see a doctor for the pills that help you stop. You make a pros and cons list of why it is important for you to stop.

The pros include feeling better, getting healthy, or saving money. The cons include getting lung cancer, wasting money, or you can’t run a quarter of a mile without feeling like your lungs are going to burst out of your chest. All of these options, pros, and cons just pile up in your mind to reinforce that you can do it, you can quit smoking.

An alternative to smoking could be getting involved with a new hobby and not having time to think about your vice. Instead of smoking a cigarette or two, you can grow plants indoors by using grow tents. Plants require a lot of time and attention from you and this will prove an effective way to overcome cigarette cravings.

The Risk of Giving Up

Three months later your car breaks down, you lose your job, or you go through a bad breakup. Here come the triggers. Now you are stressed out or depressed. The first thing you reach for is a cigarette, or maybe you think that smoking a cigar or a vape is better so you go that route. You don’t even realize at the time that you are inhaling nicotine regardless of how you are inhaling it. You just think that because you are just needing a little hit if you don’t pick up the cigarette that you are so used to, that it will not affect your goal.

However, the end result is you are right back where you started on the first day of the new year and you have broken your resolution. Now most people at this point, just say they just proved that they can’t do it, so they lay down their resolution and say maybe they will be stronger next year. But what if you had help? What if there was a training workshop that could help you from the beginning of the idea of what resolution you were going to make? I know you are thinking to yourself that there is nothing like that. But there is. It’s called assertiveness training.

Join a Workshop that Can Help

The definition of assertiveness training is a method of training individuals to act in a bold self-confident manner; is a form of behavior therapy designed to help people empower themselves.The assertiveness training workshops have been around since the women’s movement of the 1970s that dealt with mental health and personal growth groups. It grew out of the realization that many women in the movement were hindering themselves by their lack of ability to be assertive. Today’s assertiveness training workshops are used as part of communication training for such programs as substance abuse treatment, social skills training, vocational programs, and responding to harassment.

The purpose is to teach people to identify and act on their desires, needs, and opinions while remaining respectful of others. There is a broad approach to the training that can be used for different personal, academic, health care, and work situations. Some of the areas that the training helps include conflict resolution, realistic goal setting, and stress management. It also helps with our personal choices that include, but are not limited to, quitting the use of drugs and alcohol, and self-care. In addition to that, you could start attending Job Training Courses which provide you with career development, enrich your mind, and motivate you to go on with your goals instead of giving up.

These go right in line with our example of our New Year’s resolution to quit smoking along with any number of resolutions you want to set for yourself this year. Add an assertiveness training workshop to your resolution and by the end of the year, mark that goal as accomplished.

About The Author

Freya is a Math teacher, Yoga enthusiast, and a beloved mother of three lovely daughters. She is always looking for ways to grow and help others around her thrive through self-learning, meditation, and physical fitness. When she is not teaching or spending time with her family, Freya regularly writes on topics related to self-improvement and women empowerment.

If you want to have a fulfilling life you must stay within a certain range of positivity.

They say the most successful people are those who rarely see the glass as half empty, even when it is completely empty.

They are positive that the turn around will always be something good versus something bad. How do you maintain this ideology after say, a whole week of just bad luck and misfortunes?

Here are a few reasons why reading motivational phrases and quotes can keep you on the positive track indefinitely.

1. We speak things into existence.

The psychs call it positive reinforcement and it is as simple as it sounds. If you are repeatedly told that your behavior is negative eventually, you will have lower self-esteem of how you view yourself.

On the other hand, if you are told that your behaviors are enhancing and uplifting then your confidence will begin to rise. The same idea goes for taking positivity into your life.

Writing on the bathroom mirror is something that helps. It is the first thing you see when you awake and your mind is clear.

Whatever you take in at this point in the day will stick with you for the remainder of the day so begin with something that will make you want to conquer the World.

It is good to read or even listen (audiobooks are good too) to very strong-willed people in the morning.

Think of it as your mental physical trainer that is shouting at you that you have 23 more hours to get it right; go out and do something killer amazing.

2. If you see it enough times you start to believe in it more.

I see this behavior a lot with people who join congregations or any team-building environment. It is important to go to services every week if you are apart of a faith.

They want to you surround yourself with specific influences so that you will not stray. You can do this with yourself to keep your mind in happy territory.

The more positive reassurances you see and hear, allow you to become an overall better person.

3. Habits are hard to break.

After you have trained yourself to keep a level of affirmation and positive thoughts, it will be very hard to go back to your former thinking.

You will be a changed person and many of the problems you once faced will seem like some kind of bad joke to you. You’ll be able to reflect on your growth in a new profound way.

4. We have bad days.

No matter how positive you pride yourself on being, there will be days that you will blow your lid so to speak. It could be the result of something that you have kept your mouth shut about that suddenly escapes.

It could be a run-in with someone who seems to make it their business to piss you off. Our interactions with one another give us many reactions but when it’s a negative reaction on our part, we must not let it overtake us.

Repeating the positive quotes a few hours later or maybe even the next day resets our mind back to its normal state. Hindsight is always 20/20 and you may even be able to see how you could have gone about it in a different way.

5. The mind is the most powerful muscle.

“It’s all in your mind” is a very honest quote but many of us don’t honestly believe that. It is true, however.

Once you train your brain to be one way it will be set, and I have emphasized the word “training” quite a few times in this article, because it is not something that will just naturally happen more so something you have to want to happen.

We underestimate the power of our minds.

I recently saw this in myself, outside of my entrepreneurial mindset I was also struggling with weight.

It wasn’t until I began programming my brain (myself) to intake healthier foods and added workouts to my daily routine, that I got the message, being healthy is much easier than I thought it would be.

Now, if I miss a workout or eat too unhealthy for too long my body (my brain) knows that something is completely off. It has been trained. We sike ourselves out of many of the things we want to pursue because of fear.

Fear is the brain telling you “Hey, there’s unchartered territory ahead, BEWARE“. That’s about it though. It is just a signal. It is not a stop sign.

The most successful people say, the hardest part is realizing that you want something more from your life.

Tag: positive-outlook

New Year Resolution: Growing into Your Best Self