Good intentions but no follow through?

Ever felt that you keep trying to improve things and nothing works? Maybe you feel you’ve been working on your marriage but it’s not really any better? Or you’ve both agreed you want to have more sex but you never do anything about it? Or you’re trying to spend less time on Facebook but keep getting sucked back in? Or trying to lose weight? There are many good intentions that we set for ourselves, for our relationships, for our families that seem to just fall by the wayside. When we set them we REALLY mean them, we are committed, we tell friends, but something goes wrong and nothing changes. So what can you do differently?

Well sometimes having a major change or challenge can help. Something so ridiculous that it takes a lot of brain power and hence you don’t forget to do it. Or it’s such a big challenge that you become super determined. You may have a short timescale and so feel that you can commit for that length of time .. and in doing so may start to see benefits that convince you to carry on. Some examples could be:

* Giving up all sugar or crisps for a month

* Agreeing with your partner to have sex every day for a week, or 4 weeks .. even if neither of you want to! 

* For 3 weeks agreeing to turn all gadgets off at 8pm

* Entering a 10km race in 8 weeks time & running for charity so you have to train for it. 

* Agreeing to have a lights out policy by 10pm every work night to reduce tiredness.

* Deleting your Facebook app or changing to an obscure password and locking it away

* Giving up meat for a period of time

* Not drinking alcohol for 4 weeks etc etc 

The examples here could be anything and for any time period but they are to show how sometimes you need to make up rules for yourselves. It’s often not enough to have an intention to eg talk more to your spouse, because we drift back into our bad habits. You might need agreements & boundaries to try and force yourself into new patterns of behaviour. With reminders on your phone or on post its to keep you on track. What’s a radical new approach you could try? Then see what happens … it might feel really difficult but it’s only for a few weeks. Please like / share. Sue X