I have noticed that when I am under pressure that I can sometimes start to return to old pathways, to behaviours that I thought I had changed. Behaviours that I no longer want to have.
The other thing I have noticed, that if you do not recognise this or stop it straight-away, then it soon becomes the default behaviour again and the habits form.
So, after all, perhaps this changing habits and changing yourself is just a patch and really deep down all the old behaviour and pathways are still there.
OMG, all the stuff I’ve read, written myself and believed is all just a sham.
Well, no.
Changing ourselves, particularly when it comes to habits and behaviours that we have being actioning for all our lives are not going to miraculously disappear overnight or even over many years. It takes a commitment.
We will have these lapses, as we are human not machine.
The most important thing is, I have recognised that the behaviours are going back to where I was and that is a major step forward. I know I need to do something to stop that.
This is where kindness to ourselves comes in.
I can choose to say ‘well done Philip, at least you recognised you needed to change, you’ve been on that process of changing and you’ve slipped a bit’. The challenge for most of us is the being kind to ourselves bit.
Recognising things about ourselves is hard and takes practice and that is one thing time and practice has helped with, becoming more self-aware. It’s a constant work in progress.
Philip Dodson 