Heart Magazines is challenging my commitment to feel free to throw away unwanted gifts. Over the last 10 days I've probably received a dozen unsolicited and unwanted magazines. Most I have immediately taken to the recycling bin. I passed some along to a friend. Because a couple had articles about wellness, fitness, or nutrition, all topics of interest to me, I kept and mostly skimmed before contributing them to recycling.
This evening I skimmed an interview with Biggest Loser fitness icon Jillian Michaels in the current issue of Redbook. In it she shared that if we wanted to stick to a healthy regime, how important it was to know "why" wanted it. She shared that now that she has children, instead of choosing between doughnuts and skinny jeans, her "why" has changed to choosing between doughnuts and seeing her great-grandchildren.
The concept of knowing our "why" is not a new one. Management guru Simon Sinek has one of the most popular YouTube videos* describing that it is the "why" behind an action that really motivates people. As a long-time organizational consultant, I believe the failure to build shared commitment to why something should change is probably the biggest single shortcoming of senior leadership teams. So, Michaels' comments only reinforced what I already know to be true. If we don't really understand why something is important to us, we aren't likely to stick to it.
I am doing so-so with my relationship with sugar recently. As I read Michaels' words, I thought maybe that is it: I don't know why I want to avoid sugar. Well, that isn't quite true. I am badly addicted, and I don't want any substance to own me like sugar does. But along with knowing why, it is important to know in positive terms what we want to move toward. In Michaels' case, she wants to move toward seeing her great-grandchildren.
Not wanting a substance to own me is a negative. Our brains aren't motivated by negatives. I stopped reading and sat quietly and ran through an exercise I use with coaching clients to ascertain their "why." I struggled for a bit, and then finally it came to me. I want to avoid sugar so that I am in spiritual integrity. I made a commitment to myself to avoid sugar. The commitment has nothing to do with sugar and everything to do with my spiritual discipline to keep a promise I make to myself. When I indulge, and certainly when I overindulge as is so easy during the holidays, my lack of spiritual integrity sucks spiritual energy (and life) from me. When I keep commitment to myself, I am in spiritual integrity, and I attract supportive, spiritual energy.
As anyone who has grappled with an addiction knows, winning those battles happens one day at a time. I make no sweeping predictions about how I will do with my struggles with sugar. Now that I understand that, rather than avoiding a destructive substant, my commitment is one to spiritual integrity, I have a definite "why."
*https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sioZd3AxmnE
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