What I Want You To Know About Why

Every personal development or success coach I’ve ever heard speak about change has all said some variation of the same theme.  “If you want to make a big change or achieve an important goal, you have to have a very clearly defined reason for doing it.” The idea is that unless we’ve got a clearly defined “why,” we will give up when it gets hard.  I’ve got over 40 years of evidence to support that idea.  It doesn’t matter what the goal is.  It could be quitting smoking, losing weight, building a business, a savings goal… doesn’t matter.  Human nature requires us to have a solid reason for pushing ourselves beyond our normal limits.

A crappy why has never gotten me off the couch.  I have two older sisters.  One has always been overweight, the other one was always slim and smaller than me until she quit smoking. I’m average in size.  For my 19^th birthday, she picked an outfit for me.  After giving it to me, she teased me about the size, remarking that she was wearing clothes three sizes smaller within six weeks of having her children.  I’ve had body image issues ever since.  I’d never thought of myself as fat until that day.

                Two years ago, I decided to try a weight loss plan that included meal replacement shakes.  The company also has an online community for support.  In the signup process they asked about goals and they also asked about my why.  I didn’t have a good answer, so I went with the standard answer about wanting to be healthier and self-esteem.  I spent $100 on meal replacement shakes that night.  I spent another $100 a month later on a sale.  After a couple of months of limited commitment and no success, I realized that I didn’t have a solid “why.”  I knew I needed to really define my why if I was going to do what it took to get the success I wanted. 

                I sat down with a notebook and started jotting down ideas.  After some time, I realized that the real reason I wanted to lose weight was because I wanted to be skinny enough to give my sister some body image issues of her own.  I knew I would never verbally insult her the way she had insulted me, but I wanted my appearance to cause her the same type of insecurities her words had caused me. 

                Guess what… I didn’t lose the 40 lbs I wanted to lose.  The shakes made me want to gag and I consumed less than half of what I purchased.  I wasted almost $200 and actually gained another 20 lbs in the past two years.  Serves me right. 

                That, my friends, is a textbook example of a crappy why.  While that might work for some people, a why that is all about revenge is never going to do anything for me except trigger self-loathing.  My why has to line up with my values and morals.  Integrity, Personal Development and Mercy are my top 3 values.  A why that doesn’t reflect those will never work.

                Let me give you an example of the kind of why that will work for me….

                One of my BHAG’s (Big Hairy Audacious Goals) is to take a cross country bicycle trip.  While I have been to all 48 states in a truck, I want to do this bicycle trip because it will take me a lot longer.  I will have the chance to slow down, truly see the country and interact with completely different people.  I came up with the idea while reading No Opportunity Wasted: 8 Ways to Create a List for the Life You Want by Phil Keoghan.  My original idea was to travel across the country from Sacramento to the Atlantic Ocean on US 50, but the dream has evolved some after reading Biking Across America by Paul Stutzman and after finding out that I can’t take US 50 over the Chesapeake Bay on a bicycle.  The route Paul Stutzman took went from the NW corner of Washington state all the way down to the end of US 1 in Key West, FL.  It was approximately 5,500 miles.  That bike trip will be a whole lot easier if I’m not transporting an extra 60 lbs of insulation.  Granted, I can’t ride 5,500 miles on a bicycle in less than 3 months and not lose weight, but I’d like to at least have 30 lbs off before I start pedaling. 

Another solid reason I have for wanting to lose weight is my overall health.  Diabetes runs in my family and trust me when I tell you that I haven’t gained 10 lbs a year for the past 3 years by eating all my veggies!  There is plenty of documentation about the health risks associated with being overweight.  Both of my parents died young and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that if I don’t want to die their deaths, I cannot live their lives.

Over time, we are going to have several conversations about the WHY.  I can’t stress how important it is to have a good why attached to a goal.  The same rules apply when we decide it’s time to shed the baggage.  I drug my baggage around for years before I decided to do something about it.  I’d been dragging it around so long that it had become a huge part of my identity.  I was oblivious to it.  It wasn’t just heavy, it was painful.  Then one day, it became too painful.  The pain and the side effects of the pain became my why.