Happy New Year from the Intent Team! In celebration of a brand new year and brand new decade, this week on Intent we want to hear your tips on how we can make small steps to make big changes. What can we do right here, right now to begin making the incremental improvements that add up to positive lifestyle transformations?
Many of you may have already begun formulating your resolutions for the new year. Perhaps, like many other people, you want to lose weight, eat healthier, save more money, quit smoking, renovate the house or spend more time with your kids. Or maybe your New Year’s resolution is very specific to you: you want to knit more sweaters, start your own personal catering business or take a month-long backpacking trip through Southeast Asia. 
No matter what your New Year’s goals are, the accomplishment of every goal always begins with those initial first steps. Finishing a goal is a matter of continuing those baby steps, over and over, and never stopping.
So what are some small steps we can make right now in our own lives towards our own positive transformation? What are the very small things we can start doing to be healthier? To be more successful? To be more involved in social causes?
Here are some recent blog posts that may inspire you to approach your personal resolutions with bite-sized baby steps:
10 Ways to Create Small Steps and Giant Gains for the Coming New Year By Debbie Mandel
Warning! Don’t Make Big Changes in 2010 By Darlene Minini
Rebecca Pacheco of Omgal.com offers a few positive suggestions we can start doing to celebrate a very healthy and wholesome 2010 with Top 10 Healthy Things to Do in 2010.
What are the bite-sized positive steps you will be making this week, or have worked for you in the past?
In celebration of the new year, join Intent’s mission this week to inspire others with ideas, activities and tips that will inspire us begin making small positive changes in our lives. Tag your blog posts "new year" and we will be featuring the best weekly content at the end of the week. If you simply want to share a quick idea or tip in the comments below, we want to hear that as well. We can’t wait to read your contributions!
Problem is with resolutions is that they're black and white. One breach, and the game's over. A better way to handle something is to set up a means with which to score your success each day. Assess and then document.
Personal trainers know this is important. First thing you'll probably get when you join a fitness center as an exercise newbie is a scorecard to document your daily activity. For those of us who've gone to the gym for years, this is unnecessary because the habit has worn a permanent groove in our daily routine. But for those who are new, this is their lifeline to building a creditable "story" around their activities.
Likewise, adapting to any change is difficult. So score your success and be willing to accept "failure" as you traverse the path.
Secondly, it's important to take steps to tease your mind into engaging in the activity. I wanted, for example, to practice ritual, devotional prayer a year ago. So at someone's suggestion, I began tossing my shoes way under the bed so that each morning I'd be forced to my knees, if for no other reason than to fetch my footware. So, already on my knees, I was far more easily able to adapt to the desired task. As a result, I've rarely missed the opportunity to express praise and gratitude.
Thirdly, advertise your intent. Much of my life, I've been an angry, overreactive driver. So I made a bumper sticker (at makestickers.com) that simply says, "Blessed are the Peacemakers." While I'm not perfect in my quest to become a normal, rational driver, I can tell you that it is HIGHLY painful to suffer the indignity of losing my cool (most especially if I think someone has considered my message prozelytizing or self-righteous in the first place).
As young children, are minds are far more plastic and adaptable. But there's no reason that, using a few tricks to coax ourselves into growth, we can't continue to change for the better.
Live life like its a journey,not a destination
Live in the now, hope for the future, and shed your past baggage
That way you have no hard feelings for the past, you live your fullest in the now, and dont worry about tomorrow
peace on earth
Aim vertically not horizontallyshamim