Progress Adds Up

*I am posting my update early this week because I will be going camping over the holiday weekend and won’t have access to wifi or cellphone data! I’m hoping to get some reflection time in about my ILP while I’m away from technology and surrounded by nature :)*

“A little progress each day adds up to big results” ~Satya

As I mentioned last week, I was feeling pretty discouraged by what little progress I had gained. Positivity is the hardest part of my ILP for me. Negativity is a habit, and changing that habit is a constant process. After I reflected on my blog last week about my progress, many of you left me encouraging comments on how I should be happy with the progress that I did make, and you’re right! As the quote above says, even a little progress eventually adds up. This week, I have been very happy with my progress in all aspects of my ILP.

Photo CC- David Ingram

While mindlessly flipping through YouTube videos looking for inspirational videos this week, I stumbled across a piece of pure gold; Brendon Burchard. He has changed my whole approach to this project. If you haven’t seen any of his videos, I have linked a few throughout this post and HIGHLY recommend watching one (or many!). He is a very honest, and inspirational speaker. Many of his videos revolve around personal growth. His videos range from focusing on improving relationships to improving your confidence.

The first video that I stumbled upon of his was “How to Reprogram Your Mind (for Positive Thinking)”. Like I have said, negative thinking is a habit. Brendon mentions that habit is easy. It is easy for those of us who have more negative tendencies to automatically revert to negative responses to certain stimuli. In fact, Brendon compares this type of thinking to Pavlov’s conditioning. In order to change this, it is imperative to consistently flip your negative thoughts into positive ones to retrain or condition your brain into thinking positively. For Brendon, setting an alarm on his phone three times a day that reminds him “I’m not into easy,” helps him remember his goal of taking the hard route of training his brain. I spent probably two hours just flipping through his videos and have set an alarm on my phone as well! His happiness and positive attitude is radiant, and that’s the person that I want to be!

Photo CC-SydesJokes

After watching Brendon’s videos this week, I made a real conscious effort of taking the “hard” route and forcing myself to flip my negative thoughts into positive ones. I have already found this exercise to be extremely beneficial to my overall mood throughout the day.

As far as my other progress goes, I have continued to drink lots of water and exercise. I mentioned last week that I didn’t particularly care for running. I wanted to get more exercise than simply taking a walk each day so this week I rediscovered one of my passions. I have been playing soccer since I was six. Since I started college, this passion has been put on the backburner. This week, I decided to spend some of my exercising time playing soccer with a good friend! Not only did the exercise itself make me happy, but the excitement of getting back into something that I really love also boosted my happiness.

In retrospect, my progress last week may have been small, but it was still progress. This week, I was much more confident in my abilities to be able to create my own happiness. No one in the world has the ability to make me happy except for myself!

*For those of you interested, Brendon has his own webiste too that you can check out here.