September has just started and with it the beginning of the course. This month not only represents a change of routine for students, who will have to face a new academic challenge, but also for workers who return from their vacations with the aim of acquiring new healthy habits in their lives.
Because of this, many people conceive this month as a second opportunity to achieve the purposes they set at the beginning of the year. For this reason, the numbers of gym enrollees and attempts to completely reorganize a routine from which, this time, they want to escape are increasing. However, as Teresa Herrero, a coach specialized in personal development and emotional management, warns, this can be counterproductive.
As the specialist explains, it is quite common that, upon returning from vacation, there is renewed energy that motivates people to completely change their lives. “We want to fix fifteen areas of our lives in the first week, and no one can support that,” he says. Well, although having the intention to improve is always a good sign, this motivation can reachlead to overload and exhaustion in the following months.
Learn to prioritize
“Setting goals is positive, because it helps us focus our energy and move towards what we want to change. The problem appears when we try to do everything at once“. It is at this moment when what was initially an enthusiasm for changes for the better can turn into exhaustion that is counterproductive for both the personal and work spheres.
“It’s not about a lack of will, but about learning to prioritize: choosing what is important now and what can wait. Because without prioritizing, everything collapses in the first difficult week,” explains the author of the book ‘Learn to say no and set limits’. Therefore, the first step to change your routine towards a healthier one, both physically and mentally, is decide which habits are truly worth working on.
Habits that should be learned to avoid
According to her experience as a coach in emotional management, in which she has worked mainly with women between 19 and 55 years old, one of the most common and harmful behaviors among her clients is “the difficulty of saying no”both in the work context and in the family environment. A habit that can increase physical and mental wear and tear.
“It is the time of year, along with Christmas, when we receive the most requests, from work, from family, from ourselves, and when we are less prepared to say no“, he assures. This means that, when the end of the year arrives, he has had to face both the responsibilities of the job and those that simply result from not knowing how to set a limit.
Likewise, it is important to avoid what is known as procrastination. As September is seen as a new start to the year, many people tend to start new habits in this month. Those that have not been implemented or for which there has not been enough time tend to be postponed until the following January, with the ‘new year, new life’ mentality.
How to meet September forecasts
However, as the coach warns, while this kind of loop continues, people do not get serious about their goals, causing their lives to continue the same year after year. “In the meantime, nothing changes except the calendar,” which is why it is so important to know that “The perfect moment does not exist. There is only the moment when you decide to stop waiting for it“.
To avoid falling into this loop or exhaustion caused by the overload of new activities and changes in routine, the expert makes three recommendations. Firstly, choose a “single sustainable change”, which, although it represents an improvement, is affordable enough to be maintained over time. Secondly, learn to say no from the first week. And, thirdly, knowing how to ask for help and seek professional support when needed.
With these tips, not only will there be a better chance of maintaining new habits on a daily basis, but you will also learn to know your own limits and avoid overloading with tasks. “Setting limits is not doing less for others. It is systematically stopping doing more than we can sustain. And learning to say no is a way to start saying yes to ourselves“concludes Teresa Herrero, coach specialized in emotional management and professional development.