If your heart condition were so bad that you had to undergo expensive ($100,000) coronary bypass surgery to improve it, would you change your lifestyle after the surgery? Nope. Not likely, at least according to a surprising study by Dr. Edward Miller at Johns Hopkins. Miller found that 2 years after patients had a coronary bypass surgery, 90% did not change their lifestyle significantly (diet, exercise, stress, substance use). 90%! Wouldn’t such an adverse event motivate change for the better? Not necessarily so.
Being at the end of January as I send this out, many New Year’s resolutions have been made. Fewer have been kept. It is common sense that the resolutions we make mean very little without proper follow-through- whether at the gym, with eating habits, or in even more complicated areas, such as relationships.
When I’m humble enough to admit my own strengths and limitations (my human-ness), there are many things I cannot do on my own, many areas of life I CANNOT control. But for those things I CAN change and affect, I ask myself: Do I need additional support? Help? Growth? Acceptance? Is what I’m doing sufficient enough to bring the change I want? Do I have the “horsepower” to do what I need? In counseling, there are rarely quick fixes. My job is mostly helping clients identify the how of change, not simply the what (i.e., how do I eat healthier versus simply identifying a need to eat healthier). I regularly ask myself the following question that I also pose to clients: “Am I pursuing what is needed to bring about growth and health in my life?”
If you’re having trouble changing something, first of all, that’s okay. Deep breath. You will be less likely to change something if you get overwhelmed and caught up in helplessness. If you ask all of the above questions and determine you need a little bit more than “pulling yourself up by your bootstraps” (which is self-contradictory, by the way), passivity will lead to the same result- not even a heart attack can change that. If it’s time for something different, only you can decide. And if you hire me, we’ll get down to business.
Yours truly,
Justin
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