Prioritizing the Long Game

Procrastination. It’s a funny thing, really. Even when we know deep in our hearts how much we want to do something – how much our actions matter to the success we want to achieve – we still find easy excuses to avoid it. 

There has been a running dialogue in my head over the past few weeks that could be characterized as both analysis and justification. I haven’t been keeping up with this blog. I haven’t been staying “on track” with my goals that I had set only a few weeks before with conviction and enthusiasm. Only a few weeks and I have slid sideways so far that it is difficult to see the track at all, the one I had so clearly defined and embarked on. The dialogue has meandered from one validating justification to the next, but all coming back to the central question of “WHY?”. Why has it been so hard to keep up with something so important to me? Why, even in the face of public scrutiny and outward accountability have I let a priority so significant fall to the wayside?

Essentially, the important question that has dominated this internal conversation with myself is, “Why am I so resistant to change?”

Why are we all so resistant to change?

And what is the value in pondering this? What benefits have I received over these past few weeks in acknowledging my own personal resistance?

I went back to why I started this blog to begin with. It originally began with an intention to get “out there” with my own personal struggles and be accountable – to set an example to those I work with, and those I know, that being accountable is an important piece in the puzzle of personal development and growth. That in order to change, one has to have some set of parameters that encourages steadfastness when the motivation wanes, when momentary shifts in perspective change priorities, or when old habits take over the controls and lead you back to your comfort zone. You need to have another voice that challenges those arguments in your head, that maybe it isn’t worth it, or maybe it isn’t really want you want, or maybe it isn’t really possible to change after all.

But apparently starting a blog wasn’t enough for me.

Or maybe it was. Afterall, here I am writing again, and with new insights into the process. Despite the momentum that has moved me away from meeting my goal of two blog posts a week, I am still committed. I am still here, still coming back to it, still acknowledging that desire within to move forward.

February is the month where goals go to die. Our inspiration and focus from January ebbs next to the flow of forces that bring us back to “reality” – our old stories and habits and routines that some part of us (most of us, really) believes is who we really are, and what life really is. Commitments. Obligations. Our conventional lives.

But again, there’s a lesson in it. We never go backward, even if it feels that way. The universe is constantly expanding, and so are we. Today may look like yesterday, but it is not because things are standing still, it is because we are taking the past forward and making the old new again. Different places and faces, but the same story at the core. Unless we change it.

I began the year with intention to quit drinking coffee. That was my litmus test. If I could do that, it could generate momentum toward all kinds of shifts simply by taking the confidence in my own ability to change and transferring it to other things. But it didn’t happen. And I’ve put on a few more pounds, to top it off.

And that is a story I have dragged forward. 

So, this past weekend, over steak and wine and a few tears of frustration, my husband offered me an unexpected Valentine’s gift. He said to me, “you know you just haven’t made that decision yet, right?”

“Of course I have,” I said. “I write a blog. I TEACH this stuff. I help other people make these kinds of decisions and encourage their commitment to them. You think I don’t know how to make a decision for myself?”

“I think you know how,” he said, “but you just haven’t done it yet.”

How could this be true? I analyzed things, wrote things down, set things up, told other people. I put strategies in place and used the tools I know to face me in the right direction. I applied my “expertise” so that I could easily and effectively ALLOW THE SHIFT in myself so that, in turn, I could demonstrate to others how easy it can be to make big changes.

“Shawna, you are good at talking the talk. And that’s great. It helps people understand. But maybe walking the walk is the tough part.”

Those that can’t do, teach.

But wait, that isn’t my story. I don’t teach because I can’t do. It’s not the doing, for me, that’s the challenge. It’s the commitment. It’s the consistency. It’s the “going beyond the spontaneity of the moment” – the immediate gratification – to focus on long term gain. 

And that’s a piece I didn’t see clearly when I started this. I prioritize pleasure, and because of this, I neglect delayed rewards. I neglect prioritizing the long game.

In life, we are always seeking to “feel better”. It is why humanitarians look for opportunities to contribute, and mass murderers look for victims to give them a sense of power and control. These things make us feel better. Empowered. An improvement from the feeling of the current moment. In any instant, we are either on autopilot, or we are seeking ways to avoid pain and increase pleasure (this doesn’t account for mindful awareness, but that’s another blog post).

And my motivating principle is the latter.

For me, it turns out, pleasure in a moment is freedom. I have defined it in this way. If I give myself what I crave in a moment, I am empowering myself in that moment. I am “enjoying life” on my terms. I am improving things, if only for instant. 

In this attempt at ALLOWING change, I have focused on making it intuitive and easy. It shouldn’t have to feel like MOTIVATION. It should feel like INSPIRATION. Change should feel good.

But cheesecake feels good. At least on the tongue, for a minute or two.

And then it doesn’t.

How do we navigate the difficulty in effectively prioritizing short and long-term satisfaction? How do we ALLOW changes to occur without feeling like we are a prisoner to our own internal obligations?

We DECIDE what matters most.

Decisions are such powerful things, and I have recognized, through my recent period of procrastination, that I have put off making the core decision that will likely make all the difference. I have yet to DECIDE to focus on the future (or the present ME that has yet to manifest). When any opportunity to experience immediate pleasure arises, it is usually what I prioritize above all else. But in choosing those habitual pleasures, I am recycling the past. 

Maybe I haven’t really been ready, yet. Not for this piece. But maybe now I am. Maybe all I need to do is choose. Make one big decision that governs all the little ones that will come up after. I will CHOOSE the long game instead. That’s it. And then, even when avoiding momentary pleasure, I am empowered. I am making a CHOICE in that moment NOT to indulge, because I have chosen something else instead.

And, so I’ll put it to the test. I’ll see if this makes a difference. I’ll walk the talk and see how far it takes me. I’ll DECIDE not to recycle the past. And as anything in life, we’ll see how it goes.