Falling in love with The Journey

Cue up New Year’s in your mind. The stereotype will do… dreaming up new drool-worthy images of things you want. The cut body, styled house, supportive fans, loving relationships, engaging jobs. These images motivate for, what?, a week? A month if lucky. These goals are based on end results, blindly ignoring that it takes work and commitment to not only achieve those results but also maintain them. So often we get caught up with the end goal, and so frustrated that we aren't there — when actually there is no “there.”

Let's take a fitness goal for example. Once you've hit your goal to be fit, you don't just stop. Fitness isn't a thing to be achieved and checked off. “Whew! that's done.” That destination needs constant tending, so much so that it's not about the end goal as much as it is about the journey. What are the different ways you're going to achieve your fitness goal? Note that there are many different ways because you'll need to implore all of them. This keeps the journey interesting and makes you more resilient.

I'm going to switch up the wording here, because the desire to be fit, healthy and vital is more a way of life. A state of being. Goals motivate you along the way — like choosing to participate in a 5K or cycling event — but to achieve optimum health, you’ll need to call on other tools. 

Ask yourself, “What can I do to support my [desired goal/intention/way of being]?” Brainstorm some options and variety here. Get creative. For fitness this might include: cut down on drinking, pack lunch rather than eat out, eat vegetarian meals a couple times a week, have one walking meeting per week, make a hiking date with friends twice a month, set up an accountabilibuddy with another fitness friend, eat healthy before potlucks, join a weekly running group. These ideas are in addition to what may already be a 3–5 day a week gym routine.

The point is to have a variety of tactics and approaches that help support the way of being you’re creating. Something other than “I will get up at 4:30 every day and work out,” unless that really, truly works for you and feels supportive. 

That feels rigid. It could come crumbling down anytime you oversleep or feel under the weather, but I've also had a regularly-scheduled lifestyle where something like that worked for me for a decade. In either flexible or structured lifestyles, brainstorming tactics before you need them will prepare you for future challenges. If you’re sick and can’t perform a workout, you can still meet your commitment to vitality by drinking water, eating smaller portions and not having snacks, dessert and alcohol on those days. Trust there’s more than one way to keep your commitment going.

Protect against what disarms many a New Year’s goal: “Since I couldn’t go to the gym, I might as well have a cookie. I’ll get back on track tomorrow.” No. This is a continuum. You’re always on the journey. You didn’t fall off the journey and can get back on it later. The challenges are the journey, and how you deal with them is also the journey. You can still have the cookie, but phrase it differently. Rewire your brain. “My commitment to fitness is not being usurped by eating a cookie and not making it to the gym this morning. What else can I do to support my fitness today?” (Is my brain the only one that uses words like usurped?)

This is about YOU and finding what works — not just in the results, but in the journey part. What will help you love the journey, keep you going and lift you up if your commitment wavers?

Whether you dream of health, fitness, creativity, art making, financial achievement, spiritual openness, vulnerability in relationships or something else, figure out the work, habits and ways of being it takes to not only reach this vision but also sustain it. Fall in love with that work, the discipline, the process, the strength you need to call on. This helps burst the bubble that other people simply “have” what you want. You've got to work for those desires. Commit to them. Want them — not just the end, the whole process. What's the point of wanting to be an author if you don't want to write?

Falling in love with the journey gives you many tools. You learn about yourself. The journey sustains and serves you much more in life than the mere destination. Running a race will be over in a few hours, but the training period… oh, the training. The discipline, the commitment and focus… that was with you every day. That's what lifted you up and kept you going — and will keep you going long after the race. It will keep you going towards those other goals that are just benchmarks along a journey. 

It's the journey that matters. It lies quiet in the background, rarely acknowledged. Sometimes even picked on (Why do you get up so early; Really? Won't you have cake?; Don't you ever have fun?, Come on, you wrote yesterday)… But the journey is your partner. Your support system. Find the beauty, the joy, the challenge and the relief in it. Love it deeply and see how it loves you back. 

To love in its many forms~