All I need is 1%

The arrival of the new year felt like a non-event, quite honestly. We toasted sparkling cider with the kids at 7:30pm, an hour later my husband went to bed and I followed shortly after. I have yet to put pen to paper and flow-chart my goals with stars and illustrations and color coding, like I normally would. When I looked back on my beautifully illustrated, color coded list of goals for 2015 though I had accomplished a few, by and large I'd forgotten most of them. As is probably true of most goal-oriented, high achieving, type A's there's never a shortage of ways to improve. I mean. My lists were ridiculously long and spanned every area of my life. There were goals for motherhood and marriage and running and business. Goals about reading more and connecting more with friends and family. Goals about journaling and finding quiet time. It. was. ridiculous.

So this year I've scrapped the old way of goal setting. Yes, there are a few changes I'd like to make. I've gone through and asked what worked and didn't work. I've thought about a few things I'd like to do (or not do). But by and large January 1st felt like any other morning, with one exception. Instead of committing myself to massive change, I've decided all I need is 1%.

This isn't some genius idea of my own devising. My husband, who has been getting nutrition coaching though Precision Nutrition (and lost 25lbs!!!), shared the idea with me. From what he said it's the founding principal of the first few weeks of the course: not huge changes, just 1%. Just 1% different than yesterday.

That's a concept I can get behind. I can do 1%.

I can not have a glass of wine tonight. (Because the holiday habit of nightly glasses of wine made me feel like crap.)

I can have fruit after dinner instead of chocolate or leftover Christmas cookies.

I can sit on the floor after breakfast and play with my kids. I can look them in the eye. I can be whatever pretend character they want me to be instead of doing the dishes, sweeping the floor, wiping down the chairs and oh, the cabinets too, because when I bent over to wipe down the chair leg I noticed the dribble of milk down the side of the cabinet. And ugh, look at that crap under the stove...there's a grape under there. The whole house is a mess! I can't stand it. I'll clean the house today. And my kids are still waiting for me to come and play...

And that's enough.

I could continue this list of "small things," but then that wouldn't be 1%. That would be like, 20% and I can't do 20%. Or maybe I can do 20%, but right now I don't want to try. I want to do a good job with 1% until it's not something I'm changing anymore, it's something that has changed.  I can do 1%. I can cork the wine. I can reach for the orange. I can sit my ass down and ignore the mess.

I used to thrive on the idea of fresh start and radical changes and massive overhauls. Or at least I thought I was thriving. But it was anything but thriving. Many times, those fresh starts and radical changes and massive overhauls slam into the reality that change takes time.  And with that realization often comes disappointment and discouragement, and we slip right back to where we started.

So often that we forget how long change takes. I once was bulimic and now I am not. That change took time. There were nine years of bulimia and there have been seven years of freedom. But there wasn't a sudden massive change. It changed 1% at a time.

So if I want to have real, radical change in my life, it must start with 1%. That's all I need.

--Sarah

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