For many years, I couldn’t imagine that I would sit down to a dinner that was composed of salad or fish or anything that wasn’t meat and potatoes.
Although I always participated in sports, for many years I resisted the discipline of a regular exercise program.
The profession of psychology has been a good career fit for me, but I used to be pretty tired when I came home, and for many years I didn’t have the energy to spend after hours time building a website, writing blogs, preparing courses, and doing other activities to decimate my ideas to an audience that was larger than my patient population.
All that has changed. It started with a change in my philosophy of therapy as I focused more on positive psychology. And everything got easier as I did it more.
A positive outlook led to feeling less drained, which led to feeling more empowered to achieve goals that I had perceived to be difficult, which led to feeling more energized to pursue a regular exercise program, which led to being more conscious about nutrition, which led to organizing what I’ve gained from my learning and experiences into formulating the concept of Goal-Achieving Psychotherapy. Since I was passionate about my approach to mental fitness and I had the energy level to take it to another level, it only made sense to find the time and to find the ways of spreading the word to others – despite an already full personal and professional schedule.
At this point, I’ve learned what many of you have learned. It feels worse to not exercise than to do so. It’s less comfortable to eat rich heavy food than to have a light healthy meal. And I would feel less fulfilled if I didn’t use my website, social media, and in-person or internet presentations to share my excitement about the benefits of a positive mindset, goal setting and achieving, and the wonderful rewards of risk-taking and change.
I didn’t start this blog with the intent of making it so much about me. It’s really designed to be about you. Are there things that you’ve avoided trying because you thought they would be hard or risky – a career change? a diet? an exercise program? a new social group? a new sleep schedule?
If you try something new that seems hard, and you stay with it, I’m confident that you will find what many of us have already found: The more you do it, the easier it gets! And it won’t even be that hard at the beginning if you start with a positive attitude.