A Space

Change, my friends, is not easy.  We may think we are people who resist routine and habit, but even the most free-spirited among us have our ruts.  This is true for good evolutionary reasons:  if we had to do all the things we do with full attention all the time, we’d get eaten by lions and tigers and bears before we even managed to get up in the morning.  OK, maybe not lions AND tigers AND bears all at the same time, but the point stands.

 

So how, in our largely lion/tiger/bear-free lives, do we break out of our routines to make positive changes?

 

We invest energy in paying attention.

 

Let’s say, for example, that we have been having dessert at every meal.  We finish our bowl of cereal and reach for a cookie.  We finish our PB&J and grab a piece of cake.  Spaghetti inevitably leads to ice cream.  It just happens.  We don’t think about it at all (unless we have run out of cookies!).  We have to create a space between the meal and the dessert for our conscious brain to catch up so we can decide whether we want the cookie/cake/ice cream.

 

There are lots of ways to create that space, from choosing to keep the treats at the store where we have to walk or drive to get them before we can have them to making a rule about doing the dishes before we decide about dessert.  Notice that I’m not saying that we never have dessert.  We are bringing attention to the decision.  Sometimes we will choose the cookie.  Sometimes we won’t.  But we will not automatically shove the ice cream in our faces without thinking about it.

 

The truly sneaky part?  When we create this space for choice, we build a new habit around the process.  We get used to asking ourselves if we really want the cake.  We learn to check in with ourselves.