About a month and half after making new year’s resolutions, most people have already given up on meeting their goals and fallen back into old patterns. Have you lost speed on your own journey of change?
Whether you haven’t even thought about what’s got to change or you’re already well on your way to your goals, thinking about the various stages of change can help you visualize your priorities and confront any challenges that stand in your way.
The Steps So Far
Here’s a very effective approach to take when you decide that something’s wrong with your love life: Start by considering what you might be doing to make your situation worse. Then, after weighing the pros and cons of making a major change in your approach to love, you might make your plans to change official by telling your family and friends, getting help, or beginning to recognize progress. We’ve been discussing the 5 steps to change for the last month.
What happens after you’ve done all of the above steps?
You keep it up.
Maintenance – Keeping Your Drive and Determination Alive
The final stage of change is Step 5, Maintenance. Whether you’re looking for a long term relationship or want to be treated better by men, change takes some time. Your ability to persevere, to hang in there, is now the key. Even though you’ve had the courage and determination to get this far in your process of change, there still may be more bumps in the road ahead.
In this final stage of maintenance and often relapse, you’re creating new patterns of behavior. Even a one-step-forward-two-steps-backward kind of relapse can help you learn. When you date Mr. Wrong and then get back on your path, it can often strengthen your resolve to keep going after what you want and to reach your goals.
For example, maybe you’ve decided that you want to become more selective about the men you date. For awhile in the beginning of the change process, you may still be tempted to spend time with the usual type of men who don’t treat you well or aren’t looking for the same things as you – old habits are hard to break. Over time, your desire for change will make you become less interested in those men that aren’t giving you what you want. Eventually, you will find yourself interested in men that are more likely to lead you to more desirable situations. Basically, it gets easier to change.
Your ultimate goal is to be confident that you can cope with new challenges without reverting back to your old ways. But again, it gets easier over time. When you appreciate nice men who treat you well, you will find it easier to be in those sorts of relationships. You won’t want to sabotage a nice relationship when you have worked towards it. You will even be much less tempted by relationships that you already know won’t give you what you want.
Ideally, you’ll be saying this by the end: “I know how to get what I want and feel confident that I’ll find a good relationship.”
Maintaining the New You in the Face of New Challenges
Next week we’ll get into the specific kinds of mistakes that women make that can sabotage their chances at love and happiness. Maybe you’ll be able to see yourself in some of these situations and then prevent yourself from relapsing into old behavior that you’ve already decided to change. Remember, you’re not the only one on the path to a new “you”; get support whenever you need it from the Be Your Own Brand of Sexy Facebook community.
We support you!
If you’d like a step by step guide to help you on your way to a new love life in 2018, sign up for my soon-to-be-released short course: How to Become Your Own Brand of Sexy in 5 Simple Steps. It can help you visualize what relationship goals you can reach this year no matter what obstacles you face!
