Half The Time To Change Still Feels Too Long
The challenges of living in a quick-fix society.
The upside and downside of today’s world is its speed. What took several minutes a century ago is virtually instantaneous now. Food that took hours to cook can be made in minutes. The convenience is astonishing.
However, it has also devastated attention spans. People used to accept that things took time way more readily than we do now. We want it instantly, as soon as possible – if not sooner.
What’s more, quick fixes are all too attractive. The idea that a pill can make you thin, another can alleviate all your anxiety and depression, with no additional work like minding diet and exercise or seeing a therapist, is the preferred option.
Yet we forget that to get where we are, right now, was the product of time. Nobody has reached anywhere with success or failure instantly. Time, energy, and work went into it.
That’s why change in half the time (or less) that it took to get from “A” to “B” still feels too long.
Rome wasn’t built in a day
Yes, this is super cliché. Yet it’s the truth. You can’t build a city in a day.
I didn’t become overweight instantly. This is the product of years of unideal food choices, not enough exercise, comfort eating when depressed, and the like. This is the product of decades of actions and inactions on my part.
Would I love to drop 80 pounds in days? Of course I would. But that’s not realistic.
Yes, even using a GLP-1 won’t make you instantly thin. It helps, sure, but it’s not the quick fix many are treating it like. Neither were the diet shake programs, delivered food programs, surgery, or any other strict diet regimen in history.
Nope. Every single successful, long-term weight loss on the part of any individual took time. It also took focus, dedication, and effort.
If I want to take off 80 pounds, I need to be more mindful of what and when I eat, how much I’m exercising, how much water I drink, how much sleep I get, and the like.
It won’t be instantaneous. But neither will it take as long to lose as it did to gain. Yet the time, even half the time, still feels too long.
Half the time to change still feels too long
If it takes a year to build a habit mindlessly or subconsciously, building a better habit in six months via active conscious awareness – mindfulness – is an improvement. First, your result is more desirable. Secondly, you did it in half the time.
Yet that’s not instantaneous. Time is still involved. And that, in the world we occupy today, still feels too long.
Half the time to change still feels too long in the grand scheme of things. Yet it’s in no way, shape, or form unreasonable. If it took me 30 years to develop habits I have now, taking 15 to change them is a hell of an improvement.
That’s an extreme, too. Most habits can be changed far faster than half the time. Why? Mindfulness.
When you make active, conscious choices and decisions about who, what, where, how, and why you are, you are taking control. Yes, you’ll still have to work with outside influences and factors, but you’re the one driving your life.
I was subconscious when I ate for comfort when depressed or stressed. Almost unconscious when I snacked mindlessly on sugary things. Years and years of that are what shaped my body as it is today.
If, consciously, I am more mindful of what, how, and when I eat, that’s going to change me. It will also do so in at least half the time, if not faster.
To reconcile this feeling, that half the time to change still feels too long, we need more active, conscious awareness overall.
Active conscious awareness and time
Ever find yourself mindlessly scrolling social media? Playing a semi-stimulating but overall pointless game on your phone? Have you found yourself finishing a bag of chips that you only think you opened a few seconds ago? You weren’t practicing conscious awareness.
That’s how you lose track of time and wonder where it went. This is how you let time use you and contribute to the feeling that “X” feels too long. Because when you spend your time subconsciously, you aren’t aware. When you’re not aware, you aren’t present. Then, time treats you like a doormat or a rug and walks all over you.
Recognizing and acknowledging this is the key to not being sucked into the surrealness of instant gratification and quick fixes. It also opens the way to a more fulfilling and enjoyable use of your time and energy on any given day.
To become consciously aware and mindful, all you need to do is ask,
- What am I thinking?
- What am I feeling?
- How am I feeling?
- What are my intentions?
- Is my approach positive, negative, or neutral?
- What am I doing?
These questions can only be asked and answered mindfully, consciously. That inner awareness also opens you to more outer awareness. That helps you see that when half the time to change still feels too long, it’s truly not.
Lastly, but certainly not least, the positivity of this fact is incalculably empowering. That’s because this realization helps you gain more control over your life experience.
Knowing that it’s not too long when half the time to change still feels too long isn’t hard
It’s all about practicing mindfulness of your thoughts, feelings, intentions, and approach to direct your actions.
When you recognize and acknowledge that getting anywhere in your life from “A” to “B” has taken time, you can see how the subconscious achievements can be overcome in at least half the time by conscious actions. Knowing that you can apply active conscious awareness – mindfulness – to the given matter, you can make conscious choices and decisions to impact change without letting the desire for instant achievement/gratification create overwhelm and derail you and what you’re doing.
This empowers you, and your empowerment can empower others around you.
Consciously choosing your approach to life towards positivity or negativity – from the vast cylinder that exists between them – shifts life in a way that opens greater dialogue. From that broader dialogue, you can recognize, explore, and share where you are between the extremes and how that impacts you here and now.
Choosing thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions for yourself employs an approach and attitude of positivity for realizing amazing potential and possibilities for your life.
The better aware you are of yourself here and now, the better you can choose and decide what, how, and why your life experiences will be. When you empower yourself, that can spread to those around you for their empowerment.
Thank you for coming along on this journey.
This is the five-hundred-and-eighty-fourth (584) entry of my Positivity series. I hope that these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog, and spread the positivity.
Please visit here to explore all my published fiction and non-fiction.
Follow me here!
