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The Joys Of Starting Afresh

By Jed McCall

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 24Apr2010 Word count: 728 Viewed: 510 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

The other day, I gave my bedroom a bit of a spring-clean. While I changed the sheets, swept the cobwebs, mopped the wooden floor, it occurred to me how great I feel when I am making a positive change to my life. After all, here I was sprucing up a personal environment, making a difference to my environment. I was not sentimental about how the room looked before I took my duster to it; I had identified a need for change and then made change happen.

The point of this little story is not to talk about my below par cleaning techniques but to illustrate the importance of change. A domestic spring clean is a metaphor for any serious change in an individual's life. Think of the dust and the cobwebs as the bad habits, the negative thinking, and the rut you are in, which you sweep away through radical change.

A major change can occur at any time of your life, whether intentionally or through events, situations that spring out on you such as redundancy or bereavement. Your own life may change because of an event in a loved one's life; they may have to move for a new job, which may result in separation or divorce. Knowing when to make that change is often down to instinct. We have all experienced that sensation, like a gnawing feeling, that something has to give. Many people feel the need to find themselves, so they go travelling or move to a different area.

Familiarity breeds contempt. Once an individual becomes too familiar with him/herself, boredom, lack of motivation and/or negative thinking are likely to follow. If you are stuck in a rut, making a change is the best course of action, which is why the teachings of personal development experts can be so useful. Once life has become a little stale, sitting around thinking about the past is not very helpful.

Sometimes it is important to forego sentimentality if we want to feel well again; sometimes, we need to get out of the habits that are keeping us from making a positive change. So, what forms these habits? While there is no clear-cut answer to this, it seems to be a mixture of personal nature and life experience. The good thing though is that regardless of what forms the initial habit self-awareness can help you to challenge and overcome negative habits. In order to overcome crippling habits then you must understand exactly how habits develop form in the first place.

Are there any negative habits of yours that you cling to even though you know they are wrong? I am not only talking about things like biting your nails but negative thinking patterns. You see, habitual behaviour is because of conditioning. Once behaviour becomes routine, we end up relying upon habits to feel safe. A good example of this is cigarette smoking. Rather than the actual physical dependency of the nicotine, many cigarette smokers find it difficult to quit because of the routine of having a smoke. Therefore, as well as having the will, making a change often requires a change in habit.

But perhaps your habit is not something tangible like cigarette smoking. Your bad habit may be something you are not even conscious of doing, for instance, being overly self critical, thinking lazily, making excuses for your shortcomings, all of these things constitute bad habits. In the same way that bad cleaning technique won't help you spring- clean your house, bad thinking habits will not help you to make the change.

The choices you take and the decisions you take decide the results you get in life, and the choices and decisions stem from how you use your brain. Preferences develop over time, naturally. But you are in the driving seat, you are the one with the final say so. A person that is ready for change must also be prepared to search deep within their soul, look for any negative characteristics and change them.

Once you have given yourself a bit of a spring 'clean, think about learning new skills, developing new friendship networks, finding a new job, anything that will keep you fresh and stop you from going stale again. The spirit of change is what makes life exciting and comfortable. Start your new life today, and never look back.

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