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The difference between participation and commitment is like ham and eggs, the chicken is involved and the pig is compromised.
Martina Navratilova.
The new year advances and the daily activities are occupying the entire schedules of our days. Those good wishes from the end of the year parties are moving and then how can we make sure that another year does not go by without fulfilling what we want to achieve?
Many times we start that diet that would improve our health or raise our immune system, we acquire a heritage asset, we plan that dream trip without realizing it, we do physical exercise and abandon it, we never learn something new about personal relationships; we never offer quality time to our families and friends; These are some of the many things that for various reasons we interrupt and that we hardly achieve. We make a promise to each other and then abandon it halfway.
According to a survey by Mexican company A, two out of 10 people achieve what they set out to do at the beginning of the year. Other experts believe that to make a difference you have to start with a personal commitment, before doing it with other people and generating motivating energy that prevents us from giving up. It is doing an exercise in full awareness to get to know ourselves, understand who we are and what we have done so far in our lives.
Have you ever wondered: why is it easier for us to fulfill our commitments to others than to ourselves? Personal commitment is an essential attitude that we all need to achieve our life goals and overcome obstacles or fears that dominate our plans and can harm everything. Let’s think that someone we admire a lot, an athlete, an artist, someone with business or spiritual leadership and we wonder how he managed to get there? And after doing a little research, we are surprised to learn that their path to achieving these admirable goals was full of inconveniences, however, there was a process, a methodology that they followed, step by step, with discipline and perseverance, overcoming all kinds of adversity.
To avoid putting off our resolutions for another year, there are a few tools we can turn to that can be combined with the daily grind. The first thing is to stop passively admiring how other people do it and we don’t. The second thing is to activate our personal energy and develop an action plan and there we face the first obstacle: how to develop it?
George T. Dorian, a business executive, who published an article in Management Review (1981) is credited with creating the SMART goal methodology (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-Bound). ) was very useful for setting medium business goals and can be applied to personal life.
In Spanish, we define it as Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Temporary. This means that we must begin by writing down the goals that we have in a specific way, that is, exactly what we want to do, in the simplest way, and then try to explain the reason for that purpose. Let’s start with one at a time.
The second thing is to establish a measurable objective, that is, in what time can I reach that goal, a short time is better than leaving it in the long term. Some specialists recommend keeping a progress log for a diet or physical exercise plan, a diary, or a savings plan if it is a financial goal, weekly or monthly, as the case may be.
For the goal to be achievable, we must make sure that it is something that we can really achieve, it is a personal review of what we are capable of doing, according to our skills and knowledge. We may be surprised that after clearly defining the objective, we may be able to do something more challenging and recognize capabilities that we did not know we could have.
Likewise, the objective must be realistic, that is what the method refers to when it mentions the relevant word, many great activists have found the need to transform their environment based on this principle in their methodology of action since they define something that society needs or is important to us or those around us and make it a reality.
It is very important to define a time limit to achieve our goal, the use of agendas and planning calendars are useful tools. This positions us in a motivating environment to exert greater effort, seek the necessary resources to achieve it, and thus it is possible to see the results at every step. Long-term goals are generally never met.
A concrete example could be the “peasant dream” that almost all of us ask ourselves at the beginning of the year: “Exercise…” To express it with the SMART methodology, we would ask ourselves the following questions:
Specific: What type of exercise? How many sessions? How often and how long for each?
Measurable: What is the metric? A number of times performed the activity vs. planned ones?
Achievable: Is it a physical activity that I am able to carry out?
Relevant: Why do I want to do it? How will it impact my life? What do I want to do it for?
Temporary: Is it an activity for a specific period of time or do I want it to be the start of a new long-term habit?
If we turn the answers into a sentence of commitment to ourselves, the materialized declaration could be:
“Today (day) I promise myself to do five weekly sessions of 30 minutes of walking because I need to improve my heart and circulatory condition, to prevent diseases and feel happier. I will do it from the last week of January until the last day of the year. I will keep a calendar to record each session and I will reward myself each month with (reward) for having fulfilled in that period”
The people who have led the great positive social changes began with a methodology of individual transformation that turned them into examples for society. From a personal commitment, they generated the transforming energy of the entire environment, this is possible because they stopped being spectators and became agents of change. At Del Pueblo Funeral Home we want to inspire you with positive thoughts so that everything is better in this new year and that you honor yourself as you honor your word before others. We accompany you in your resolutions and we remind you that we make the most difficult moments easy.
