If you could build a wall and perfectly isolate yourself from the world, would you then be able to keep the commitments that are important to you? Before you jump to the conclusion with a resounding, Yes!, think very carefully. I bet if we had a discussion with a Tibetan Monk, who had spent decades in an isolated community free from distraction we would learn an unfortunate truth. That truth is that it is not the distractions of the world, or the demands of others, or the relentless requirement to pay your bills that prevents you from keeping commitments, it is your own mind.
Yup. Face it. Deal with it. It is the truth, ugly and simple. Our minds are the single largest reason that we struggle, fail, or fall short of keeping commitments to ourselves. We can try to blame a litany of third parties, conditions, and circumstances but the reality is that our reality is constructed and viewed by our own minds. We are solely responsible for our own actions and reactions. So if you DID have a chance to isolate yourself, perfectly from the world you would discover quickly that it was not the world after all but yourself that was the problem.
Hidden in your little bunker, behind your wall, you would probably find out that your mind was still weak, susceptible to distraction, and unable to sustain the effort and resilience to keep a commitment of serious magnitude. Unless of course you have a strong mind, and in that case you already know the truth and this blog is unnecessary reading. A strong mind is something that is built overtime, it is a muscle. It gains strength through repetition under load. First starting with resistance it can handle and then gradually increasing the time under tension until the mind, the muscle, can resist greater amounts over longer periods of time. A strong mind can withstand elements thrown at it from the world, from other people, from circumstances beyond its control. A strong mind has experience, been there before, understands how to adapt, change course, keep the commitment regardless of the circumstances.
If you have or are failing to keep a commitment, it is because you have a weak mind. Do not feel bad about this. It is exactly the same as going to the gym and trying to bench press 300 lbs and completely failing. You would not expect to go to the gym and do that type of weight on day 1, and by the same comparison, you should not expect your mind to keep a really tough commitment perfectly either. You must start with smaller loads, with consistency as the target at first. Once you are consistent, then you can start to add more burden and by nature increase the resistance. Training your mind, as with training your muscles, requires patience and time. You must be consistent above all things before you start trying to handle too much.
This is precisely why people fail in new resolutions so often. They have the wrong focus. You need to focus on consistency first, not anything worth bragging about. For example, if you decided to keep up the habit of running as a major commitment in 2020. You should NOT set a goal of running 5 miles every day, or even 1 mile every day. You should first just set a goal to run every day, even if it is 10 feet. The point is that you take action, with consistency. Make the thing you commit to as easy as possible so that you will get it done, with no excuses. This will, overtime, build and strengthen your mind. Instead of talking yourself out of running, which the mind will try to do all the time, you convince your mind that you are going to run no matter what. When that is achieved, you can then start to add difficulty.
Perfect isolation is NOT the solution, nor is “getting away.” Taking a break is just a cop out. What you really need to do is to make a commitment, then make sure the commitment is ridiculously easy to do. Then you can get your weak mind trained right. It will begin to expect this to happen every day and over time will naturally be ready to handle more. Before long, your mind will be as tough as that Tibetan Monk’s. You will be bending spoons, or at least your own will to achieve your greatest dreams and ambitions. The challenge you and I have is that we can really overcome any obstacle, and we can do so with our own minds. The first and only step is to realize there actually is no obstacle, only your stubborn, lazy mind that insists that the obstacle is there and in the way.
Guy Reams
