Starting with a clean slate? Maybe not

It’s a new year; time for all the ‘new year, new you’ hype. Yuppee (read ‘Blah’). People talk about starting over with a clean slate and whatnot, but the reality of the matter is that all the baggage you’ve had last year just carries over to the new year and nothing really changes; the grudges you hold are the same, the debts shackling you are the same and the weight….yup, still there.

Change doesn’t happen overnight. Actually, let me rephrase that; internal change doesn’t happen overnight. External change (the one out of your control) could, such as sudden losses, getting fired/evicted/cheated on/divorced… But I’m not talking about those. I’m talking about internal changes, those within yourself. They happen over a period of time. Slowly. Painfully. Intentionally.

In Outliers, Malcolm Fladwell talks about the importance of 10,000 hours of intentional practice. Intentional practice. Not the passive wait for the second hand of a clock to act as a magic wand and wipe all of yesterday’s sorrows away. As much as we’d like to be, we’re not Cinderella, and life is not a fairy tale.