Episode 22: New Year

For many of us, the New Year is a fresh start, an opportunity to get a new outlook on life. This week on The Living Experiment, we talk about the nature of the New Year experience, from the "New You!" media frenzy to the tradition of setting goals and resolutions, to the value of investigating the motivation behind those desires. We share our favorite approaches for pursuing change in our own lives, and explore expert theories about why your goals may be eluding you. "New Year" Episode Highlights The New Year holiday as the caboose on the Thanksgiving-to-Christmas marketing train (2:10) Arguments against January 1 as a hard date for making big changes (4:00) Pilar's Goal Flower model for setting and achieving goals (7:10) Accomplishing less instead of more (10:30) Why uncovering the belief systems that are holding you back may be more effective than simply addressing surface problems like excess weight, disorganization, and debt (12:15) Dallas's approach to goal setting (and the holidays) (13:30) Making resolutions when you're ready and in your own way, instead of when and how the calendar or culture says you should (16:40) The shared energy of forming new habits with everyone else in January (or any other time), and the value of using camaraderie to launch into autonomy (20:15) Creating sustainable change and escaping commercially-driven cycles (23:15) The Prochaska Transtheoretical Model of change (25:15) Dallas's insights on self-sabotage, and Pilar's thoughts on our inherent "immunity to change" (28:30) Making small transformations on the road to accomplishing larger goals and avoiding self-sabotage (34:10) The difference between building sustainable change and making cyclical changes to break up an unsustainable lifestyle (38:15) The right and wrong motivations for modifying behaviors – love vs. fear (40:05) The power of conscious language (42:30) How to embrace the opportunity of the New Year to achieve what you really want (44:45) Acknowledging universal obstacles to change (48:50) Suggested experiments for the week (55:25) This Week's Experiments Dallas suggests: Look at the changes you want to make for 2017, and articulate the motivation behind them. Ask yourself: Am I doing this out of fear or out of love? Replace a behavior that has typically been fear-based with one done out of love. It doesn't have to be a different behavior; it may be the same action, but with a different motivation in play. Pilar suggests: 1) Make an Immunity Map following the steps in the Experience Life article, "How to Overcome Immunity to Change". 2) Create a Goal Flower using the "Cultivate Your Goals" section of Pilar's "Refine Your Life" workbook. Get full show notes at http://livingexperiment.com/new-year/