Break the habit
As the old cliché goes, it's taking that first step on any journey that really counts. I don't know about you, but while I'm aware that the choices I make and the responses I have to certain situations aren't always ideal, changing those reactions can sometimes seem impossible. It's like telling you to walk on the ceiling when you've only known life on the floor.
However, as Dawna Walter points out in her book De-Junk Your Mind (Penguin, £8.99), much of what we do in life we do through habit. Learned responses are hardwired into us from the time we're born and put on our first feeding schedule. But while some routines are good to get into (regular flossing, remembering to pay your credit-card bill on time), others – especially emotional habits – embed themselves in our psyches. Before you know it, you're only saying yes to chocolate ice cream 'because it's my favourite', when really that's the case because you haven't been bothered to try raspberry ripple for years – or at all.
Stuck in a rut?
And no, of course we're not really talking ice cream – think of it as a metaphor for other repetitive behaviour in your life. Are you someone, for example, who always falls for the same type of men? If so, chances are you're caught in a bad habit that probably needs changing – after all, women who bemoan their 'type' aren't usually referring to the kind of man who sings your praises from the rooftops, more a feckless, serial adulterer with an abiding weakness for her best friend.
When yes means no and vice-versa
Even your outlook on life – what you might consider to be your moral centre or code – can be based on habits learned early and ingrained over a lifetime. If you find yourself responding to things before you've properly considered them, there's a good chance that that's why. Equally, if you're finding yourself, again and again, in situations or with people that you know aren't really good for you, chances are it's a learned response – or habit – that keeps taking you there.
The good thing is that the more you're aware of this, the better you're placed to break the habit and prevent it from recurring. It's not always going to be easy – it takes courage and honesty to set off on a new road – but when the alternative sees you running round and round on an emotional hamster's wheel, what's there to lose?
Practical magic
Putting things in black and white helps you to see things more clearly. So take the time to focus on an aspect of your life – whether it's those troublesome men mentioned earlier, or perhaps you feel stuck in an unfulfilling job – and write down honestly what you give to and get out of such situations and why you do it again and again. Ask yourself what effect your repeated behaviour has. As Walter writes, 'By looking at the degree that your habits impact on your life, you're able to determine how important they really are.'
Self-awareness gives you the opportunity to break bad habits and move on. But don't forget to turn your attention to the good habits you've established in your life too, whether that's building and maintaining strong friendships or applying the necessary discipline to do well at work. It's all too easy to focus on the negative. Knowing our strengths gives us a model for how to move on.
Let it go
No one expects you to turn your life around in a moment, so start small. Break your routine by changing the way you travel to work, say, or book somewhere new to go on holiday if you're always heading off to the same place. Through making small, focused adjustments, we build up the knowledge, strength and courage to face the big ones and move on.
The only way to really change things long term, however, is to learn to let things go. 'By forgiving yourself and others for all that has happened in the past, you free up space in your mind to allow in new things,' says Walter. So many of us hold on to the past, nursing hurts and anxieties until they become so much a part of who we are that we can't imagine life without its extra helping of long-held hurt and pain. It's not about forgetting – learning from experience makes us the people we are and informs our future selves. But by allowing yourself to forgive your own behaviour as well as someone else's, you start to shake off the old ways and open yourself to new ones.
De-cluttering is the same whether you're getting rid of excess material baggage or removing the unwanted and unnecessary leftovers of emotion that cause a jumble in your mind. You need focus, determination, self-awareness and understanding. But most of all you need the courage to realise that all that stuff you insist on bringing with you does little more than weigh you down.
