We made it a habit in our society to put a label on any kind of repetitive inner work: HARD. It’s hard to build a new skill, it’s hard to do things differently, it’s hard to change a habit, it’s hard to be in a new way.
I propose a different approach: change is natural as we are creative by nature.
Change is not hard, it is simply repetitive. What makes it hard is our expectations, comparisons, doubts, self-judgements and self-flagellation.
“I’m an idiot.”
“I’m lazy.”
“I should have done this by now.”
“I never finish what I start.”
“This is pointless, I’ll never make it.”
“I’m stupid.”
“This is hard.”
“How come they do this so naturally?”
“Man, I suck.”
“Fuck this. My life is hard enough without this bullshit.”
“I’m doing something wrong. It’s not supposed to be taking this long.”
“Maybe I just don’t have it in me.”
“I can’t change this, it’s my personality, it’s who I am, who am I kidding?”
These are all thoughts that we choose to believe at one point or another that truly make doing anything new hard, a pain in the ass really. It does not have to be this way though.
First of all anything you set your mind to make happen is just a goal. If there is any kind of magic to goals and intention setting it is definitely not in getting reached; it is in who you become on the way to reaching them, as you devote your energy to them. Goals are just a way of engaging your courage, boldness, flexibility, joy, acceptance, peace, creativity. Nothing you could ever achieve is worth you feeling like a worthless piece of shit for even a tenth of a second and yet most people who set out to achieve something reach a point where they feel extremely bad about themselves, especially if that goal is bold or personal.
Then, there is nothing hard about repetition AND it can be really FUN. All it takes is that when we feel off the path to stop, look, correct and take action towards the direction we want to go to. When children learn how to walk they fall a lot and yet we intuitively know that scolding them will not be of any support. Not much changes when we grow up because whatever we are taking on that is bold or new, we are a beginner in. So what if we would start cutting ourselves some slack and just recomit to our intention joyfully whenever it looks like we slipped - because even in going off course we are a hundred of steps ahead of giving up or never even trying. Nothing major happens when we slip off, it is part of learning, there is no way to avoid it so we might as well accept it as part of the process of change and have fun with it. Let’s stop taking it so seriously and show ourselves some love because the point of whatever we want to accomplish is to feel good in the end, so let’s make the process a fun, delicious, easeful one!