New Year - New Habits - Day 2

01/03/2012 - Day 2

As I fell asleep last night mentally preparing myself to follow through with day 2 of my new routine, I realized that some of you may be thinking I’m a hypocrite for my comment about “Law of Attraction freaks…” For the record, I am a Law of Attraction Freak and proud of it! So to anyone who was offended, and wondering why The Eternal You blogger was bashing the Law of Attraction, I apologize…I was making a funny.

It seems that 6:15am is becoming a recurring theme for my blog posts, since here I am again. My ability to wake up swiftly at 5am was hindered slightly by my daughter who woke me up at 4am by climbing into our bed. When you wake up from a deep sleep, realize you only have 1 hour left and then fall back, it feels much harder to pull the sheets off and stand up when the first few notes of music fill the air. And pushing the snooze button is not an option because that just perpetuates the wrong habit; especially on day 2. So I did the next best thing. I turned off the alarm and fell back to sleep!

But thankfully my guilt was powerful and I grabbed my willpower by the balls at 5:30am, and stood up in my dark room dazed and confused about why I was doing this. I muttered something to myself to the effect of, “Big picture Paulie, big picture…” An image from Darren Hardy’s Compound Effect came to mind about him waking up to his father lifting weights every morning around this same time. If you haven’t read the book, I recommend it. It really helps get your head around the importance of small changes in your life, compounded over time that create the powerful force of monumental change. Heck, if I keep this up, think about the ripple effect that this new 5am routine could create. As the 12 steppers say, “One day at a time.” In a few years from now my whole life could be significantly improved by this easy (I say easy because, as Jim Rohn put it, it’s something I can do.) change and new habit.

I think we all should start this year by picking the smallest, easiest little positive habit that we’d like to add into our lives and do it every single day. How hard can it be, really, to grab that floss each night, put 1 less scoop of sugar in our coffee, eat 1 more piece of fruit, take 1 more flight of stairs, say “I love you” 1 more time, smile at a stranger, say “thank you!” to the Universe, pat yourself on the back for your accomplishments, and hundreds more that we could add to this list. These are all easy to do and I guarantee that if you do them daily, you will, over time, see huge changes in your life.

I’m really looking forward to all the ways that my life is improved by taking control over myself, waking up a little earlier, writing a little something, and getting active every day. I can imagine that over time I’ll be waking up a few minutes before my alarm ready for my day. My writing skills will undoubtedly be sharpened and more organized. (God knows I need the organized part! I mean, have you read my posts…there all over the place! Maybe I’ll start a separate blog called, “Paulie’s Scattered Thoughts” or something like that. Oops, I’m still in my parenthesis rambling aren’t I?)

One of the best ways that this new routine will change my life is by proving to myself that I CAN DO IT. That simple fact is enough to launch a hundred new habits, changes, and improvements! Not only can you do it, but it’s easy! It’s easy because you CAN.

Here’s to you and your new habits! Heck, here’s to me too! I’m on Day 2!