New Year Podcast Episode

Ted’s top suggestion for how to have a good New Year’s resolution or to follow a goal that you need to have a plan for getting back on track. Happy New Year, everyone, and welcome to Breaking Bread, a podcast brought to you by Apostolic Christian Counseling and Family Services. Ted Witzig, Jr. is with me today.

Welcome, Ted. Happy New Year, Matt. 2018. Wow. Isn’t that amazing? How long do you think it’s going to take before we write that correctly? Yeah. When we write the dates. Yeah. You know what? Speaking about writing dates, everybody’s going to write that date in time, like you said, once we learn it.

And when they write that date, they’re commemorating Christ. Yeah. Isn’t that amazing? That is 2018 years since Christ’s coming to this world had such an impact that it has reverberated. Yeah. Isn’t that amazing? That is amazing. So that reverberation is continuing. We’re kind of now in the 2018th wave since him.

But as we speak about those waves moving outward into the future, I’d love to hear your thoughts on resolutions and New Year’s Day and what should we be thinking now, 2018? So, this is a time that a lot of people do a reflection on the last year. In the news and things, they’ll have the top ten web searches and the top ten of this and those kinds of things. And then they’ll start thinking about what’s coming. You know, I want to lose 15 pounds. Losing weight is one of the top resolutions. Getting fit and healthy is one. You know, spending more time with friends and family.

Those kinds of things. And there’s certainly nothing wrong with setting a goal or having a resolution, so to speak. But I will tell you this, Matt, that it is no secret that most people who set lofty goals around the time of January 1st, right there, do a crash landing by the end of January. And there are some predictable reasons why that happens.

And maybe we could talk a little bit about that. I’m not theoretically agreeing with you. Yes. Okay. I am practically agreeing. So, I’ll say one of the things that happens is that, in general, the kinds of things that people make resolutions about are not bad things, okay? I want to grow in my relationship with God. I want to connect with old friends. I want to be a prayer warrior. Yeah, but one of the problems with a resolution like that is that as an overarching goal, that’s fine, but the question for reaching that actually comes down to mundane. It comes down to the day to day or the week to week, and it also especially comes down to what happens when you’re not following your resolution and one of the biggest reasons that people don’t follow any kind of plan and whether it’s a New Year’s resolution or somebody wants to stop smoking and then they pick it back up again. What do we do when it doesn’t work? And most people carry an all or nothing mindset.

So, it’s like, January 1st, I’m hitting the gym, I’m going to do this, I’m going to do this diet, I’m going to lose these pounds, and they go hard driving for a couple of days, couple of weeks, maybe a month, but they don’t recover from backslide. And then, when stress happens, this happens, and then bang, then it goes awry. All out the window, and then they say, why try?

And so, if you would say, Ted’s top suggestion for how to have a good New Year’s resolution or to follow a goal, is that you need to have a plan for getting back on track. What most people do is base their resolutions or their goals, if they’re not doing it at New Year’s, on their feeling of motivation at the time they make it.

And you know what? That is a tremendously fickle feeling. You know, let’s put our finger on a really strong point on January 1. Yeah. Okay. And here in this office, we talk a lot about vision. Yes. Having a vision. Yeah. Being thoughtful about where you want to be, whether it’s a relationship, an emotional situation, a struggle, it is so critical that we have a good vision.

I mean, without a vision, the people perish, the Scripture says. And so, the vision comes easily. Now we’re talking about another part of that puzzle. Yes, and I agree with what you say that right now, like at this time of year it is a good time to take stock where we have been and where we want to go?

And that is a benefit and having a vision for the future whether it’s for family or finances or whatever are good things. The question is what kinds of things are we going to use to keep us on track over time? And there are some things that can really be helpful along with that.

Okay, so one of the things, and research shows this pretty prevalently, is taking time to write it down and to write out what your vision is, and any kind of benchmarks along the way, what you’re going to do, writing it down is one of the things. A lot of people are like, oh, it’s in my head.

Take some time. This is where I want to go. This is why I would also tell you that doing things alone, like this is my little private goal, versus telling somebody else. A lot of people say I’m not going to tell somebody else because when I fail, I don’t want that accountability. I don’t want to be embarrassed.

And you know what? They’re already predisposing what’s going to happen. And so, the fascinating thing is having somebody to check in with. We have these check-in points. Why? To readjust. To say, where are we? Are we behind? Are we off course? Or has something else taken priority? And I would say this, that it’s okay and I would say it’s even expected that there’s going to be course corrections. Yeah. Well, I want to link what you’ve said there. As you mentioned, getting back up. Yes. It is a huge part of this plan that you need to have. And you’re in the business of helping people. You help people in a sense carry out these visions for personal growth. That’s right. So, are you saying a part of what you do in your job is think about that plan? That’s correct. Every one of my clients, okay, I might’ve missed one here or there, but I would just say every one of my clients sometime in their work, is going to develop what’s called a red flags and relapse prevention plan.

And the red flags are those things that indicate I’m slipping. Okay. Or I’ve fallen off my plan, whatever it is. Let’s say somebody was trying to live within their means and they retire some credit card debt or something like that. And they had a plan that X times a month, they were going to make sure that their budget was updated or once a month they were going to go through it with a mentor or whatever a red flag would be.

I’m not meeting with my person. I’ve stopped. I haven’t done those checked in. Okay. But then the relapse prevention plan eats the pudding right down. What are the things that I need to do to stay on track? Now you say, but that’s just simple. We all know that. Well, I would say it this way, when we’re at our best, we know what we need to do. Okay, but let’s say they’re trying to follow an exercise plan or eat healthy or lose weight or whatever. When they’re frustrated, when they’re under stress, if you ask them, what are your skills? What are your tools right now? They’ll say, I don’t know.

Yeah. Eating a bag of Oreos. Right. You know, that’s the only skill I can remember. Yeah. Okay. And the point is that we don’t want to let our vision and our goals be subject to our emotional self that is under stress and is frustrated. Because that side will certainly come. That’s part of being human. I wish I could tell you, Matt, that there was a way to just short circuit that, but the key is how do I get back in the direction that I want to go?

Yeah. You know, I’ve noticed too, I don’t know if this is common, but for me, it’s hard for me to reflect on my progress and see past the last failure. Does that make sense? So, I may have had some real victories, but most recently, I remember the failure. Yes. And then that, in some way, clouds my whole assessment of the situation.

Absolutely. And there are a couple pieces there, and I’m really glad you brought that up, because we become very referenced by that failure or that success. And we say, I was good, I’m bad, you know, those kinds of things. That is right when we need those support people and accountability people right there to say, okay, dust yourself off.

Let’s figure out what happened and get back on track. Okay. Because right then we’re not good with perspective. Yeah. Okay. So having somebody else. The other thing is that right there at that time, if we’re going to measure our overall progress over the year by a setback. Okay let’s say that somebody’s trying to get a new job, okay, and they’re putting out resumes and things like that.

But let’s say the resume comes back, not accepted, not doing this, can’t get into this school. What starts to happen is those things start to define the person. They start saying, I guess I’m a failure, I guess I’m this. And what we really need to start doing is to step back and be able to say, am I moving in the direction of that value?

So, let’s take another example. So, direction. Yes. Direction is more important than location because we have to accept that along the way, regardless of whether you’re learning to practice a piano or whether you’re parenting, you will have setbacks. Okay. And I think one of the funny things is sometimes people think when they come to a counselor, the counselor is just going to say things like, oh, everything’s rosy. Everything’s good.

You know what I’m going to tell people; this is going to be hard. Yeah. Okay. And you can do this. We just have to take it in smaller pieces. The other thing is to remember that if you are going to try to do something good, Okay? Let’s say it’s to grow a relationship with somebody or to learn the Scripture better.

Do you think that our adversary, Satan, is excited about your goal? No! There’s going to be drag to it. If you have a goal that has anything to do with something that fulfills living the life that God has laid out for you. So, Satan has put a target on your goal. So, would there be some value even as we think about resolution, as we think about vision?

And this is even broader than a New Year’s resolution. This is life and progress and growth. But there’s probably some wisdom in sitting down at the outset and saying, what’s the drag to this going to be? What’s the cost going to be? And when that cost comes due, how am I going to handle that? Exactly. In writing down the goals, when you think about what your vision is, it’s good to understand why you want to do what you want to do.

It’s also good to understand the things that are most likely to trip me up. So, let’s use a simple example of somebody who says they want to grow in some kind of thing spiritually, whatever it is. They have a hard time remembering the books of the Bible. It’s a great goal. I’m glad for people to start wherever they are, okay?

And we know that Satan’s against it, flat out. Number two. We can pretty much understand, right off the bat, that busyness is going to be an enemy. Yeah. The reality is, I’m going to be fighting for time. So, how can I build that in? How can I build encouragement? And so, let’s say, the person says, before supper when we sit down, we’re going to have a prayer and then we’re going to say the books of the Bible together.

And even if we have to read them, okay, we’re just going to read them together. And you know what? We’re not going to get it done every night because we don’t eat supper in this house every night. So, let’s aim to get that done four nights a week. Okay, put the list of the books of the Bible right there.

Set it up for success. And also set it up for when you realize we haven’t done that now for two weeks, that you say, I guess we’re going to start today. Yeah. And to get back on track. What I really liked is the optimism there and you brought the large vision down to very bite sizable.

That’s right. Yep. That’s doable. And that’s got to be a critical part of this. It is. I would say that one of the reasons people do not achieve their goals, whatever they are, is they have a great goal, but the steps they have to take are too large. Some advice I got when I was writing my doctoral dissertation. It was simple advice, but I’m telling you, it changed the way that I thought about it. This person told me, Ted, you need to see your dissertation as a journey of a hundred steps, and right now you’re on step three, okay? And your job, all of it, is to get to step four. And all of us who have had piano practice in our past can tell you that’s exactly why I’m not the concert pianist that I once thought maybe I might be.

Yes. Yes. And you know what? The other thing, and piano’s a great example, people don’t reach goals without hard work. Yeah. Okay, but here’s the interesting thing about it is whether it’s building a relationship, practicing something, learning a skill, what you find is through practice, through work, okay, the joy comes on the back end.

The interesting thing is when you look at people who are having trouble with life, okay, life is not going well, they want the pleasure on the front half. They want pleasure now with no work. I’m going to give you a realistic vision that a person might have. Okay? And I want you to give me the first step. Okay. Alright? Sure. I need to have a relationship with my neighbor. Okay define the issue. Have you ever met them, or do you have a problem with them? I’ve not met them. Okay. Look for that opportunity to get over there and just say hi, introduce yourself, ask a few questions, and keep it short and light.

The reality is, relationships rarely go from not there to deep in a short period of time. And so, your job is to start planting seeds. I want to be a prayer warrior. Gotcha. All right. Figure out what style is going to work the best for you. Then ask yourself this question, what can I do that is meaningful and manageable?

And that might mean I’m going to pray for these five things on a consistent basis, or Mondays I’m going to do this, Tuesdays I’m going to do this. The thing to remember is to plan for when you don’t hit it. All right. Here’s another one. I know this year I need. to have better boundaries with my family.

Gotcha. Let’s say it makes you anxious to say no to something. What is one place that I can start? With kids, let’s say it’s boundaries around bedtime, or let’s say it’s about when we need to leave a place or whatever. And the point being, pick one thing or one place to start. Don’t try to reshape and reframe all the places of your life all at once.

That’ll set you up for failure almost inevitably, trying to change too much at once is oftentimes a problem. Yeah. Okay. Another one. I want to lose weight. The number one thing to do is to understand yourself, your body type, and your needs and not to chase somebody else’s. It has more to do with the mundane. For example, let’s say you need an exercise plan. Okay, if you don’t know how to do an exercise plan, you need to talk to somebody who can help. But somebody who is going to fit your style. Okay, Ted, another one is I have a wrong obsession in my life and call it addiction, call it a vice. In 2018 I have got to make motion on this okay, great.

The number one thing is to identify a couple of people who are going to walk with you on that journey and are going to help you sort it out and bring them in. Yep. And that’s true of most change processes where there isn’t some place that is getting checked on or accountability.

And again, sometimes when you talk about accountability and things like that people have a negative connotation to it. I will tell you that it is one of the most freeing things to be able to have some other people or sometimes do check-ins where you can say, okay, where are we? Let’s do the course correction.

Let’s figure this out. Let’s celebrate our gains. Let’s understand where we’ve had setbacks. And then let’s grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus. So, Ted, we started this podcast talking about 2018 years since Christ. And we don’t want to cast the image that it’s all up to us to straighten our lives out.

And we can, we can take that approach and that’s probably a pretty good reason why we don’t carry through. Yes. So, bring Christ into the growth of our life. Yep. So, a couple of things I would say there, number one is that I would really encourage everybody, including myself, to see our desires for growth as part of our sanctification.

That is part of growing in Christlikeness, putting off the old, putting on the new, and seeing him as not only just like a resource over there on the side, but seeing him as the reason we should go forward front and center. So, I would encourage people to connect their goals some way, somehow, to the Lord into something that has that kind of significance. So, for example, I want to lose some weight, but if it’s just because I just want to lose some weight, that’s one thing. But I want to be a good steward of my body so that I’m able to serve because my body’s his temple.

I want to be able to get down on the floor and play with my grandkids those kinds of things. Another thing. is to not see him as separate from your struggles. He understands that some things are very hard, that they’re cyclical. I love the Apostle Paul when he says the things that I don’t want to do, that’s what I do. And the things that I want to do, I don’t do. And he was going back and forth, and he was frustrated. But then what was wonderful, he said, oh, wretched man that I am. And he just finishes up, who’s going to deliver me. And he says, thanks so much for Jesus, is what it comes down to.

And so, at the beginning of our day, at the end of our day, we’re going forward in the strength and power of Christ. And further, to Paul’s example, as the thorn in the flesh remained for God to be glorified, that in God’s wisdom, he knows what needs to be done. Yeah. And he knows what needs to be let bent.

Yeah. For his glorification. Absolutely. And with that, we’re oftentimes befuddled because we are seeking a once for all cure. And a lot of the things we’re talking about are actually things that need to be managed well over time, that we need to be grown and matured through. Sorry, but your plan for your physical fitness is not a cure.

It’s a way of life because Christ wants to walk with you. Absolutely. Growing in understanding of the Lord is not just for 2018. And if you think of it as all or nothing, I’ve got the cure thing, it just sets us up for this all or nothing as opposed to training and just growing in godliness.

Awesome. Thanks a lot, Ted. Thank you. To our listeners, happy new year. We’re looking forward to another year of connection, another year of podcasts. Thanks for being along with us.