by Page Remick

© Page Remick – All Rights reserved
www.purezing.com

Many of us make resolutions but find we lack the willpower to fulfill them. Stop smoking? Sure…at least until the next craving. Give up chocolate cake? Sure... until someone puts a slice in front of us.

Willpower doesn’t work. You can’t ‘will’ something to change when your whole body and mind are wired to do what you have always done.

Wired? Yes, since childhood, your brain has developed neural pathways that trigger your habits. Every time you smoke or eat cake, the neural pathway gets a little stronger.

There are four ways to reduce an old habit (neural pathway) and start a new one. It’s as easy as closing your eyes.

Visualize. See yourself eating processed, greasy and sugar laden food…and let the image first become black and white, then smaller and smaller. Make the image so tiny it disappears. Next, picture yourself eating a meal that looks natural, healthy and appealing. Make the image bright and clear. Make it very colorful and so big it fills a giant screen in your mind.

Next, feel the enjoyment. With your eyes still closed; feel full and satisfied. Feel the food in your mouth and notice how wonderful it tastes. Feel vital and healthy. Feeling is just as important as visualizing.

Practice visualization and feeling at least five times a day. Always be sure to minimize the old habit; making it dull and small. Practice making the new habit bright and large…and experience the good feelings of the new habit. Every time you practice, you form and strengthen a new neural pathway.

Think of Pavlov’s dogs who heard a bell every time they were given food. Eventually, all they had to do was hear the bell to start salivating. Visualizing, feeling and repeating an image can train you; just like Pavlov’s dogs.

The fourth method is to do. Prepare a healthy meal and notice all the details. Smell the food, admire it, slowly taste it. Close your eyes. Feel and see the mental meal just as vividly as you do the real one. Open your eyes, taste, smell and see every detail. Close your eyes and visualize what you have just experienced. Feel healthy, slender, sexy and vital. Enjoy every positive visual, mental and emotional sensation that you can summon.

At your next unhealthy meal, ‘see’ the meal look dull and smaller. Hold your nose to dull the taste of the food, and ‘see’ it as unappealing and insignificant. Feel empty and bloated, fat and unhappy.

It took a lifetime to form neural pathways that created your current habits, so allow a few weeks to form new ones. You’re not exerting your will to make the change; you are literally wiping out old habits and adding new ones in your brain.

Athletes ‘see’ their competitors small and indistinct behind them. They see and feel themselves sailing over the finish line….over and over and over!

Four easy steps; and yet those four steps can create healthy new habits. The more often you take those four steps, the faster you will get to your destination!