Turn Your Resolutions into Acceptance

It’s the time of the year to be a new you, right?

Do you have anything on your New Year resolutions list for 2016? Maybe to stop eating sweets, get more aerobics, be wiser with your money, go to bed earlier, or get rid of a bad habit.

​​​Getting it right?

Resolutions or setting goals can provide a fresh look at who you are and what you want to do for the unblemished year ahead.

“Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right,” says Oprah Winfrey. But be careful if you think that “get it right” means getting yourself right.

Why? Because while we can get things right – like taxes or learning new software – it’s a losing battle to apply “right” to the essence of who we are. We’re always growing and changing. So the idea of being “right” keeps us from loving ourselves as the wonderful and complex humans we are, moment to moment.

Still, we have dreams and desires. So here’s an alternative to New Year’s resolutions, to help you change…and rest as well: Acceptance.

The traditional path

First, let’s explore what can happen with traditional resolutions. It’s easy to get caught in self-criticism or fear… which takes you away from rest. For example, say you want to banish a bad habit, maybe eating late at night.

That resonates for me – I want to stop snacking around 8 p.m. Here’s how I’ve tried in the past: I remind myself that I’m not really hungry, that it’s better to not eat for 12 hours, that I’m getting flabby, that I don’t need the food. Then I’d drag myself away from the kitchen until the morning. Phew!

But if I didn’t succeed (I’ve tried often to change this life-long habit), what happens from the perspective of “getting myself right?” I lie in bed, stomach full and bloated, mad at myself for eating, especially food I didn’t even like that much.

That sets the stage to either stay awake finding all the reasons I’m a shameful person, or stay awake to distract myself with Facebook, online shopping, or other diversions until my stomach stops hurting and I can rest. Believe me, this is a familiar path. And I head into my resolution the next day feeling like a failure.

The road of acceptance​

Acceptance is a different road. It leads to a greater sense of inner wholeness and self-love, which is a stronger place from which to make changes. And from which to rest. Here’s how to turn resolutions to acceptance:

1. Accept you did what you didn’t want to do: Grrrr, I spent an evening devouring toast, leftovers, cookies, fruit, and more toast with butter.
2. Shift your focus to right now: Instead of distractions of Facebook or self-hate, I go deep into my experience.
3. Inquire into what you are thinking: I start with my thoughts, practicing the words of acceptance: “Okay, I’ve eaten all that crap and I feel lousy. I can’t go back and undo it, but I can focus on where I am right now.”
4. Invite gratefulness: I remember in the grand scheme of things, it’s not a huge problem: “I’m here, alive, safe, and in a warm cozy house. And I would still like to stop being in this rut.”
5. Accept the body’s sensations without judging them: I don’t want to go there, but how does my body really feel after all that eating? My stomach feels heavy, dark, thick, solid. As if it were angry and stuck. Yeah, my body seems mad at me – it didn’t want all that food, and I hadn’t really cared.
6. Accept the emotions that arise without judgment: What other emotions do I feel, besides angry and stuck? Sad, lonely, frustrated. I can tell by the teariness behind my eyes and tension in my jaw.
7. Accept the actions you previously judged: Could I think back a few hours and imagine what I felt when I was eating compulsively? Mostly numb, but also lonely, despite having family in the house. What was driving my actions besides bad habits?

Surprising insights

It occurred to me how this habit of eating mindlessly might have started.

As I child, I was the one to put myself to bed, alone. No doubt I felt lonely then, and found comfort in food.

Instead of blaming my history for my eating, would accepting my history change my habit? I imagined telling myself “Goodnight, Sondra, I love you,” in the evening. I thought that might help shift my bad habit through acceptance and self-care. Since not much changed from my resolve to do it right – with tension and anxiety after failure.

Outcome of acceptance

Knowing this possibility of soothing myself in the evening, I was able to relax into my body – as full as it was – and rest into myself.

By accepting, I was no longer right or wrong when the urge came to mindlessly eat. Instead, I had a new framework to understand my habit of disappearing into food – and helpful self-talk to change it.

This year, if you’ve made resolutions, turn them into acceptance, and see what comes.
Enjoy your nights and enjoy the New Year. Just the way you are.