You’re Never Too Old for Baby Steps

A lesson adults seem to forget is that regardless of what you want to accomplish, the best way to go about it is by taking baby steps. There's often an unrealistic expectation that because you're "old" you should be able to achieve your goals perfectly within a short period of time.

Break the whole into small manageable and measurable parts. Focus on the things you can control or work towards. In To Change Your Life, Learn How to Trust Your Future Self, Jeff Wise says:

"In order to change your behaviour, you need to trust yourself."

You trust yourself by setting ridiculously attainable goals. As you baby step towards each successive goal, you gain trust in your abilities. "I can do this!" becomes your mantra. You gain a more realistic expectation of both the time frame and how to do it.

Baby Steps and Stress

Baby steps include missteps and false steps. Without a cushion of stress techniques to temper your falls and fails, you may give up too soon to see your successes. Impatience and stress make for strange walking partners. When you're stressed, negative emotions can take over and put unnecessary hurdles in your path. An imbalanced nervous system creates havoc for you. The chemicals that are released during the activation of the stress response has side effects that drain your energy, destroy your resilience and batter your commitment to the achievement of your goals. When you transform your stress by managing your emotions, you walk through life with an invaluable life skill. Contact me to learn how to gain this skill.

Baby Steps and a Chronic Illness

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) can be like an unpredictable rainstorm, drenching your intentions, and forcing you to retreat. Your destination is barely visible through the downpour, and the last thing you feel like doing is stepping out.

Pain, flares, doctor appointments, and low energy interfere with your ability to work toward a goal. These goals could be anything from finding a partner to having a family, building a career, getting fit, learning a language, or traveling the world.

Just as an umbrella shelters you from the rain, strategies can cover you as you step toward your goals.

Continue to read Weather the Storm of RA with Baby Steps and an Umbrella on HealthCentral.com.

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