Ki Inspiring Thoughts

As we near the halfway point of the year I would challenge you to think back to the New Year's Resolution that you made. Many of us make resolutions, but most of us do not follow through with our good intentions. According to a recent article, ninety-two percent of New Year's resolutions are not kept. I would like you to take the time to evaluate the progress that you have made or have not made in achieving your plans and goals for this year. If you did not make any resolutions this year then I challenge you to make a couple of "Half Way Through The Year Resolutions." Notice I said one or two, because I want you to feel truly passionate and committed to your resolutions. The more passionate you are about the resolutions you set, the more likely you are to be successful in achieving them.

As you reflect upon these thoughts, you may have a difficult time sorting through the large range of opportunities you could pursue. If you are having difficulty coming up with your most important goal(s) for the upcoming year, then you may want to think about your specific goals in the following five areas: physical health, spiritual well-being, relationships with family and friends, contributions to the community and professional aspirations. Sa Bum Nim Foley, Founder of The Center for Humane Living, teaches that true happiness is achieved through harmony of these five areas of your life, as opposed to the more commonly held belief that balance in one's life brings happiness. When envisioning balance in life, you can picture a teeter totter with you standing in the middle constantly moving, trying to stop the teeter totter from falling too far to one side. This thought alone brings up feelings of stress, frustration and disappointment. Now let's instead use Dr. Foley's analogy of a life in harmony. This idea is envisioned in the act of strumming a guitar. When one plays a guitar, each string produces a note. When these notes are strummed together, the result is a beautiful musical cord or the sweet sound of harmony. Continuing with this analogy, it should be our goal to adjust the tension on each of the strings to produce life's beautiful harmony. Certain areas of our life will inevitably take precedence over others, but if at the end of the day we have achieved harmony within our lives, that is when we will feel most at peace. Take time during the next week to evaluate your short term and life goals with regard to the areas of physical health, spiritual well-being, your relationships with family and friends, contributions to the community, and professional aspirations.

Another secret to joining the select group of people, who are successful in achieving their New Year's resolutions, is to share your goals with someone. This small act will produce within you a feeling of accountability which will increase your chances of achieving your goals.

Next, as you develop your goals it is important to formulate them in a positive mind set. This will allow you to monitor and see improvement as you work towards achieving them. Allow me to use an example of how we often stray from our true goal or intended outcome. The most common New Year's resolution is to lose weight. People usually set a goal that they want to lose a certain number of pounds. So they join a gym and go on a diet. Because we all want to see immediate results many people begin to weigh themselves every morning to monitor their progress. The difficulty with this approach is that every time they weigh themselves they receive negative reinforcement. The scale doesn't immediately move, or it works for a few days, but then they hit a plateau and they become discouraged by their perceived lack of success. They often give up before they have had a true chance of succeeding.

A better approach would be to set the goal of getting into the best shape of your life and then track the gradual improvements that are made as you run a little bit longer or faster, or perform a few more sit-ups or push-ups. This is the essence of the Japanese concept of "Kaizen" which translates as continuous improvement. This mind set is much more rewarding and is more likely to result in greater success in achieving your goals. With Kaizen as the goal, you will receive positive reinforcement with each and every achievement no matter the size and you will not limit yourself to what you set as your initial goal. As you begin to improve, the set point of what you want to achieve naturally changes and now it is not a "New Year's Resolution" but a life changing resolution.

KAIZEN!!!!