According to US News and World Report, 80 percent of the folks who make New Year’s resolutions have failed to keep them within six weeks. By February 14 they are feeling ashamed, incapable, and depressed. But before we change Valentine’s Day into Valium’s Day, let’s take a closer look at how our good intentions slid off the icy path of perseverance and into the dirty ditch of despair. Perhaps we can discover a more successful route to take or at least how to improve our traction so we can avoid spinning our wheels out of control and falling flat on our asphalt.
On June 10, 1935, Bill W and Robert S founded AA. What is it and why is it so successful? In the briefest of summaries, Alcoholics Anonymous is a peer-based, mutual-help, spiritually infused, 12-step program dedicated to recovering from the disease of alcoholism through total abstinence. Participants are anonymous. The need for God and a good neighbor stands at the core of AA’s triumph. Other people are needed to have sponsors, be accountable, and seek forgiveness from those who have been hurt in the past.
If sheer willpower could keep us loyal to our pledges, then at least 33 percent of New Year’s resolutions would continue past the last day of January.
They don’t.
In his book, “The Power of Habit,” author Charles Duhigg explains why. He confirms our need, like those struggling one-day-at-a-time in AA, for a higher power that can only come from the Almighty. Habits are strong but God is stronger. Only by cultivating the virtue of humility can we come to see and accept this truth.
None of this should come as a surprise. In a culture that is rapidly preferring prideful self-identity and technology over humble dependency and spirituality, we are not only bound to fail but also setting ourselves up to do so. At what cost? The expense receipt is registered plainly in the black and red profit-and-loss columns of our financial spreadsheets. Diet pills and spas, stockbrokers and advisors, headhunters and cross-training are expensive and rarely come with guarantees. The trinitarian solution—dependence upon God, having a trustworthy neighbor, and cultivating humility—has a proven track record of setting us free from enslavement to bad habits and the price is absolutely free!
Holy Homework:
During this month of Valentine affection, let’s make one “new” resolution—faith, finance, or fitness-related—whatever we need most. Let’s create a heart-shaped poster with that resolution written in the middle. Next, surround the resolution with three words: God, Neighbor, and Humility—the three sponsors who will lend us support. Suspend this poster way below the transom of the door we use most to enter and leave the house. How far below? Low enough to make sure we will be forced to nod our heads to pass underneath it. Finally, we can pray that this habit of having to bow when coming and going will remind us to be humble and loving toward God and neighbor while building a daily habit that keeps us true to our February resolution for the months to come.
Happy “New” Valentine’s Day.
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