Recent surveys show only 75% will keep their resolutions just one week into the New Year. By six months these commitments fall off to an amazingly low 46%.
So why do we make them? (Good question.) Superior question: How can we keep them?
Try making them more realistic. Then write and reflect on them. There’s a famous Yale study, which showed graduates who simply wrote their goals accomplished them far more than those who didn’t.
Joshua 1:8 tells us to meditate (reflect) so we may DO: “Do not let this book of the law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
Finally, make your goals small and realistic. “Inch by inch it’s a cinch. By the yard it’s hard.”
A couple of years ago our congregation read “Seismic Shifts”. The book’s premise: great earthquakes happen only after little cracks in the crust create small shifts. Little changes, done over time, lead to lasting results. “Sow a thought, reap an act. Sow an act, reap a habit. Sow a habit, reap a lifestyle. Sow a lifestyle, reap a destiny.”
One of my top ten all-time favorite movies is “What About Bob?” featuring this concept called “baby steps.”
Small changes leading to big ones works for positive and negative actions and attitudes: “For want of a nail, the shoe was lost. For want of a shoe, the horse was lost. For want of a horse, the battle was lost. And for want of a battle the war was lost.” The course of a nation changed by a single nail.
That short walk after dinner each night gradually builds our stamina and strength. Limiting myself to one dessert a day starts shedding the pounds. You get the picture; you know the drill.
The five bridesmaids of Matthew 25:1-13 did so much right, but didn’t pay attention to one small detail that made them miss out on the whole wedding.
Maybe we SHOULD sweat the small stuff.
Wise King Solomon said: “Catch for us the foxes, the little foxes that ruin the vineyards…” (Song of Solomon 2:15).
What baby steps do you need to take today?
