There is something new I am trying to work on in my own personnel growth. I want to change where I am headed but not where I am going. Let me explain. A lot of what I have worked on up until now has been about moving away from things I do not like but what I should be doing is moving towards the things I do like and want in my life.
Let's look at an example. I have written several pieces on the subject of ending procrastination and they have boiled down to this we should stop putting things off. That is a moving away strategy. The moving towards strategy as it relates to procrastination would be this: Do things as soon and as quickly as possible while still maintaining the quality of work.
The difference here may just seem semantic but it goes deeper than that. Rules of avoidance tend to create a pessimistic approach to life as well as making us feel limited. We make rules that confine our behavior and then we find ourselves feeling stifled and boxed in. But when we phrase our objective in terms of what we are trying to replace the bad habit with it gives us a built-in alternate behavior to the one we are trying to change. In the procrastination example our focus is shifted from the not doing of things to getting things done. We do not walk around saying to our selves I have this, this and this to do. Instead we can say I am doing this and then I will do that.
Besides putting a positive spin on the things we are trying to change a moving towards rather than a moving away strategy causes us to change our focus. When we act solely to avoid a situation we can end up lost, wandering around in the wrong place. When we move towards what we want we will naturally draw away from the things we don't want but since we are focusing on where we are going we are less likely to wind up getting lost along the way.
On an unrelated note: with yesterdays discussion of novelty I decided to do some work on the site and add a new commenting system. Let me know what you think of it as I am still deciding if it is going to stay. Have a great day and thanks for stopping by.
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