And HOW SUPER SIMPLE the solution is to REALLY stick to them
You probably know the drill all too well: you start your New Year’s resolutions on January 1 (or 2, because you still have to finish those doughnuts). Or you start when you’re ready. You REALLY want to acquire new habits this year. You are soooo done with it! Eat healthier, spend less time on your phone, exercise more and maybe you also want to quit or cut down on drinking or smoking. The first day it goes smoothly and you are super proud of yourself. After a few days you notice that you start to find it more and more difficult. You get irritated. Especially if you started doing several things at once. You’d rather just be strong and not give in to your bad habits or addictions, but it seems like it’s stronger than you. You are angry with yourself. It hasn’t worked out again. With the redness of shame on your cheeks, you mention at birthday party in February that your good intentions failed again. Or you say nothing. You get pissed off and think: Why can’t I just do this? Why am I so WEAK? I HATE myself!
Want to learn to love yourself? Read this if you want to become your own BFF….
Or maybe you gave up on those good intentions a long time ago. You probably tried, but you quickly realized you couldn’t do it. Or at least you believed that. Regardless, it went wrong. Never mind. Screw those resolutions. You think: I’m just fat. Or not athletic. Or addicted to booze or cigarettes. It’s part of me. But deep in your heart you would love to get rid of it. You often think about it: WHAT is the reason that you are not succeeding? And why does it continue to affect your life? Why are so many things not working out for you? You feel like a victim. Why is all this happening to you?
Believe in yourself
You are not alone, believe me. The root cause, the number one reason why you and so many people fail to establish and maintain good habits, is very simple: you don’t BELIEVE you can do it!
You don’t BELIEVE in yourself……… (click here if you want to learn that)
You have too little love for yourself. You are not your own BFF. That’s why you don’t succeed. It may sound bizarre of harsh, but it really is true. Maybe you think this sounds ridiculous or it makes you sad or angry. It hits you hard and maybe you don’t even want to admit it. Or you may be thinking, WTF! Totally logical. I recognize all your feelings too. For years I thought I was WEAK and I scolded myself because I thought I MUST be able to do it. I HATED myself because NOTHING seemed to work out. I had the CONVICTION from an early age that I couldn’t do it. I was just fat and stupid and ugly. I believed that for years. Thankfully, I have come to realize that this is not so. I don’t have to believe my THOUGHTS. Every time I did NOT believe in myself, the new resolution did not work. Deep in my heart, I never believed at first that I could lose over 30 kilos and maintain that weight. I weighed over 100 kilos. You can read more about my “weight loss story” in my book #beyourownbff. Only when I held on to that glimmer of hope that maybe I WOULD be able to do it, did it begin to work. Purely by willpower, that is. That’s a part I do differently these days myself.
I CONSCIOUSLY choose to take good care of myself, and I also believe I can. And no, that doesn’t mean everything always works out first try, of course not. There are also days when I struggle to stick with something. But when that happens, I am kind to myself, comfort myself (or my inner child) and just go on quietly the next day. I love this approach. I taught myself in 2023 to exercise more, but in a way that suits me. And that is, for example, starting every morning with a 10 to 15-minute workout. I didn’t feel like going to the gym, but found an alternative. Purely with a mat and some weights. “A little bit” means almost 2 hours per week in total. Also, I no longer drink alcohol as of September 2023. Why? To challenge myself to learn something new. And because I feel it’s better for me. Of course, sometimes I choose things that are not as good for me (like a packet of crisps or a cigarette) but that is also a conscious choice. I don’t make a big deal of it, they are moments of enjoyment and not addictions. Enjoying in moderation has to be possible. And sometimes there has to be something to learn of course ;))
More causes
Maybe you’re like, “Yeah, but I really can’t do this. It’s different for me. It always goes wrong. I have a harder time than others. I’m dramatic. In my situation, it’s just almost impossible. It’s been a struggle all my life. It just sucks! I totally understand that. I had that too for a very long time and BELIEVED those thoughts were the truth. I thought SUPER negatively about myself and THATāS WHY it didn’t work out. I didn’t believe in myself, just like you donāt now. What is going through your head now are all the beliefs (thoughts) that are stopping you from going for what is right for you. More about this you can read in the book #beyourownbff.
Beliefs often come from the past. You may have had them as a child, such as “I’m not good enoughā. This causes you to have thoughts that stem from those beliefs. As a result, you do not believe in yourself. And that keeps repeating itself, until you YOURSELF intervene and read this, or take another action to become your own BFF.
Why should you believe me?
You either feel that or you don’t. That too is very simple. I’m not going to convince you, but I do want you to know that I also allow you to believe in yourself. I wrote a book about becoming your own BFF. I wrote it in Dutch and now it’s also translated in English! It’s also called #beyourownbff. And you can buy it here for only ā¬11.11. In this book I describe my own story about the journey toward learning new habits and taking better care of myself. I had initially written it for highly sensitive women, until I realized: it is for ALL WOMEN! Well, if you want to learn new habits and really change the FOUNDATION that is š
You can learn from this how to start doing it YOURSELF or YOUR way. Are you not much of a reader? I would especially recommend the first 3 chapters. Because they teach you how your FEELINGS (Chapter 1) influence your THOUGHTS (Chapter 2) and therefore take care of how you behave, i.e. your HABITS (Chapter 3). Really. HOLD ME BACK. This is soooo incredibly interesting!
SUPER SIMPLE
So, it is SUPER SIMPLE to stick with new habits and that is: become your own BFF, so you start believing in yourself (again). You may be thinking, ‘yeah sure, stop it, this sounds TOO easy. It doesn’t make any senseā. And yes, maybe it does sound easy, but that’s what it is: simple. Let’s not make it harder than it is. You get to learn that it’s nice to take good care of yourself and that, as a result, you WILL stick with your habits because you love yourself.
But, yes there’s also a BUT: I have to add: Just because it’s simple doesn’t mean it’s always easy and that it’s all going to happen IMMEDIATELY. Becoming your own BFF, learning to believe in yourself is a process. How long it takes varies with each person. You will stumble regularly and sometimes you get up. BUT once you start learning to love yourself, then you will have the FOUNDATION in place. The belief in yourself and that love for yourself. THAT is THE FOUNDATION for all the new HABITS you want to learn. HOW COOL IS THAT! You can go on with that for the rest of your life. YOU CAN DO IT!
You can order and download the book #beyourownbff here because it’s an eBook. And for the ridiculously low price of ā¬11.11. BI-ZARRE. But I grant it to you.
Do you also grant it to yourself?
YES!!