Life by the Mile is a Trial
By Sharon Gorman
“Life by the mile is a trial, by the inch it’s a cinch.”
When I think about changing something about myself it can be very overwhelming. A few months back I decided that I was ready to start working out again so I’ll use that as an example. Now why only a few months ago did I have to re-commit to working out? Why after starting new regimes so many times in my life did I have to decide to start over – AGAIN? Well maybe that is a topic for a whole different Monday. Suffice to say that if I got enrolled in that discussion than I wouldn’t have time to get to today’s discussion and probably would talk myself out of starting again. So let’s stop beating myself up about that and start looking at today as a new day. Follow this line of thought because many of us get frustrated and stop right here. This whole message is probably annoying you by now because this line of thought has gotten you nowhere before except frozen in your tracks. Think of any behavior that you are hoping to change. Some that come to mind to me is saving money, going on a food plan, praying daily, meditating, disciplining myself to stay away from negative thoughts or starting a more successful PR plan for my office. Anything that would be a change falls under this category. How do we take the thought to improve our behavior and make that a reality for ourselves in our lives.
The old slogan “one day at a time” goes a long way for me. I know I can do something different today. If I start projecting if I am willing to do it that way tomorrow or “forever” I might quit before I even get started but “today” I can do almost anything. I’ll give the example of eating sugar. I can go today without eating sugar yet if I thought of not eating sugar ever again my mind would go crazy. I would start worrying about how I’m going to get through a wedding I am going to in June. Why bother starting this now if I know that I can’t go through my birthday in July without eating a piece of my cake. See the logic? My mind can go on a field day. Yet I know that for today I can do my life a little different.
I can plan out my day to make a little positive change. That is the other place my mind can get stuck. I get these big plans and then I look at what I can realistically accomplish today and then I want to quit because I can’t get the whole thing done in a day and I might get frustrated and quit. I have to break down the goals in little bite size pieces. I need to set it up so that whatever I can accomplish today I can celebrate and feel good about my performance. So if my goal is to work out daily and I work out today than I have achieved my goal. Sounds simple but again my mind wants to change the whole big picture all at one time. It reminds me about the patient who wants to be cured in one visit. Now accomplishing one visit will reduce the person’s subluxations yet it won’t do away with all the years of not getting adjusted yet we have to celebrate the one visit. We have to set it up so they will win or they wouldn’t want to play.
This is your life. Only you can change you. You can’t change anyone else. As you change you, everything in your world changes. If nothing changes, nothing changes. Sit down right now and write down a commitment to yourself. Make it simple. It only needs to be a little change for today. Don’t sit and think about doing this and not do it. Nothing will change except you might get a little more disgusted with yourself. You might get a little more frustrated and sometimes the pain of those feelings is what you will need to motivate you. Think of how good it will feel when you take the first little step. Remember how good it felt that first day you started working out again. Remember how good it felt the first day you started doing staff meetings again. Allow yourself to feel that way again. Take the first step. Let me remind you that “Life by the mile is a trial, by the inch it’s a cinch.”
Thank you to those of you who shared this past weekend with me at Focus. It was such a fulfilling weekend for me and I feel “full.” I love and appreciate you. You guys amaze me.
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Dr. Sharon Gorman is a graduate of Life Chiropractic College. Upon graduation, she associated with her mentor Dr. James Sigafoose. She opened her own practice in June of 1985 and in 3 months was seeing over 100 patients a day. Within 4 years, she had established four chiropractic practices seeing combined over 5000 patients a month. Now, married with 4 children, she still practices part time and manages 3 successful practices. She is a speaker at Dynamic Essentials, New Beginnings, Parker Seminars and is the founder and hostess of the Focus Philosophy Weekends. Visit her website at: www.focuschiropractic.com
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