Creating Habits with Compassion

As the hustle and bustle of the holiday season comes to a close, we often find ourselves facing the enormous pressure of what January brings: New Year’s Resolutions. The pressure,  stress, and urgency of deciding which habits to kick and how to push ourselves into a healthier routine tends to actually have the opposite effect: more stress, less adherence, and more disregard for what we truly need. This January, Harmony wants to help you shift your mindset about how to reset in the new year by slowing down to offer compassion, reflection, and rest as essential pillars in establishing and maintaining a healthier, happier you.

How do you determine what goals to set? What resolutions to commit to? So many of us respond to these decisions in such haste, letting the urgency push us into full speed ahead. However, if we get our feet planted firmly and allow our eyes time to clearly take in our surroundings, we can forge a path that gets us to our desired destination.

Nature models the value of slowing down in the winter. Let that be the cadence in which you make decisions around what goals to set. Dedicate this month to pause and reflect. Get clear about the details of what you want and how you could realistically attain parts of it. Ask yourself: What worked? What didn’t work? Identify any barriers that could keep you from following through on what matters to you. It could also be helpful to make lists of these things. Writing things is a great way to order our thoughts and get clarity.

During these reflections, it’s also important to shift your mindset around building new habits with a more realistic lens. Be flexible. Habit building ebbs and flows. Some weeks we will crush it every day. Other weeks, we will be lucky if we stick to anything. Growth is not linear. Expecting that there will be some instances of falling off the wagon will allow you to give yourself the compassion to climb back on the horse the next day. Don’t let black and white thinking lock you out of finding your stride. Progress is progress, no matter the speed.

Which brings me to the final piece: finding your stride. Everyone has strategies that work for them and ones that don’t. Much of this will be trial and error. Give yourself space to try new things and give it a little time to really gauge if it fits for you. Try things like habit stacking (i.e. pairing a habit you want to form with a habit you already have in your routine). For example, if you have a goal of moving your body more and you already brew coffee every morning, do some stretches while your coffee brews. Since coffee is already ingrained in your routine, adding the new habit in at that time will help you to remember to upkeep it. Take your time to find what works for you!

Above all else, be sure to give yourself grace as you move through this season. Forming new habits requires repetition and time. Don’t let urgency rob you of believing you aren’t making change. Change takes time. Encourage yourself to be flexible about habit building and be sure to consider your capacity. You might not do every part of your new routine in one day, but doing one thing is still worth celebrating. Remember, we can’t shame ourselves into change but we can love ourselves into evolution.

                                    Have a Safe & Happy New Year Everyone!