Having the desire to change your life and lifestyle, and actually making those changes, are eminently possible. You have it within yourself to accomplish your goals and aspirations.

The first obstacles present themselves are when trying to figure out exactly how to change. This is what remains vague, unknown, and indeterminable for many people. It is my experience that those who fail to achieve their goals are often simply having problems getting out of their own way in allowing this growth and change to manifest.

Make yourself aware of the reasons why change sometimes fails:

• Failure to identify all the important reasons for change: Maybe you didn’t do enough of the heavy lifting and introspection up front. Maybe you didn’t fully examine the causes and conditions that created your desire to change. Simply go back and move beyond the preliminary information you gathered and into more detailed explanations to build a stronger foundation for growth.
  


• Inability to identify and prioritize the one crucial reason for change: Maybe you did all the work, but, when trying to do the next right thing, you ranked needed steps in the wrong order. Go back and examine the relative importance and urgency of each basis for modifying your actions.
  


• Lack of commitment: You need to be convinced that you’re on the right track. You have to be reminded of the need to change. Determine what you really want, given the myriad of choices before you. Once you’ve decided to make a change, make that the only option. Don’t think to yourself: “I’d like to change,” or “I really want to change,” or “Please let me change.” Simply take the actions necessary for change.
  


• Lack of determination: Train your mind to make better decisions. Learning to make better choices involves looking beyond immediate perceived value that you can derive from any activity and instead understanding every opportunity you're faced with. You may perceive that a certain opportunity offers a specific advantage to you ... and yet, you must also recognize that you will be required to sacrifice something else in order to attain it - time, money, miles, physical or mental energy, whatever the case may be.
  
  The key to determining the actual opportunity cost in your particular situation is to balance the gain with the loss and decide if whatever is leftover meets or exceeds your original motive for making the decision. It takes time to adjust to this mindset, but once you welcome the practice into your life, you'll find that it gets easier with each new challenge that comes your way.
  


• Ineffective planning, implementation, and assimilation into your life: We’ve adapted the saying “The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray” from 18th century Scottish poet Robert Burns. Expect the unexpected. Don’t be distracted from your primary aim. Always have a Plan B, C, and D waiting in the wings, but don’t worry about events that you can’t control.
  


• Lack of follow-through and discipline: People fail because they do not finish what they start. 90% of people who buy a book do not finish them. 70-80% of the people who take seminars never do anything with what they learned. Why do you think that is? (See the heading of this paragraph for the answer).
  


• Inability to see instant results: You don’t achieve a sufficient number of “quick wins” to keep you interested and motivated. Change often occurs gradually. Making change a part of your everyday life requires patience, endurance, and persistence.
  


• Failure to remain flexible: Life happens. It’s dynamic and unpredictable. Chaos and change are parts of life. We cannot manage the unmanageable. The sooner we learn how to embrace movement, change, and randomness, and deal with situations and feelings that are confusing to us, the sooner we’ll find safety in learning and growing with all that’s happening in and around us.
  


• Allowing the reasons not to change to crush the reasons for change: Sometimes, when we don’t remind ourselves, we lose sight of what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, and where we hope to be when we work for change.
  


• Fear: Many people choose not to act instead of making the decision to act. In order to move beyond our fears, we must walk through our fears – our fear of failing, fear of ridicule, fear of success, fear of leaving our comfort zones, fear of being alone in our endeavors, fear of the unknown, etc. Once you begin to deal with your fears, you may not know exactly where you’re going, but you won’t feel as lost anymore. In addition, you won’t sell your soul - compromise your beliefs and values - to deal with the opportunities and challenges that come your way.
  

In summary, you will achieve successful change when you recognize the intense emotional experiences you're having, you identify external threats, and when you remember the important events that motivated your desire to change in the
first place.

Written for Dumb Little Man by David B. Bohl, creator of Slow Down FAST. Visit David at the Slow Down Fast blog or join one of his monthly teleseminars.