Motivation - Be Willing to Improve Yourself

MOTIVATION –  Be Willing to Improve Yourself


By Nikki Viljoen of N Viljoen Consulting CC – December 2011

James Allen says “People are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves.  They therefore remain bound.”

This particular human trait was made quite prevalent during my holiday this year.  Here’s the story – I met this older man (let’s call him George), who has a real problem with acidity in his system. It’s really bad.  Not only does the poor old man suffer with arthritis but his legs are full of open sores that he then scratches badly in an attempt to stop the itching.  From what I can gather, he has been to several doctors and none can assist – I now know why.

You see George loves to drink wine – in particular dry white wine, but if there is no white wine open, he will gladly accept a glass (or three) of red wine or anything else alcoholic that is going.  George is also partial to tomatoes and granadilla’s and . . . . . .  I’m sure you get the picture.

In have suggested that George take some ‘base powder’, which is an alkaline type powder that will assist with neutralizing the acid in his body, but that of course won’t help on a long term basis because George puts more acid into his body than anything can neutralize.  The result of course is, that according to George – ‘the doctors don’t know what they are doing and he doesn’t believe a word that they are saying.”

I carefully explained to George that he would need to cut down on his alcohol intake as well as the acidic fruit and vegetables that he favors and that together with the intake of ‘base powder’ would help to reduce the level of acid in his body. George declined to reduce his alcohol intake, but he will “try” the base powder.

The reality of the situation is that George’s body will continue, unsuccessfully, to battle to remove the acid from his system.  He will continue to suffer from arthritis and he will of course, continue to experience open sores on his legs.  More importantly he will continue to increase his acid intake as he drinks more and more white wine or red wine or anything else alcoholic that he can lay his hands on.  Sadly, I will be the villain in the story as I will be the one who told him to take ‘base powder’ of course it doesn’t work.

As you can see from the story, George wants his circumstances to change but he is unwilling to change his own lifestyle in order for that to occur.

Many of us, both in our personal lives and our business lives, lament things that we would like to change.  Whether it is to do with our health or our finances or our clients (or lack thereof) or anything for that matter that makes us sad or makes life difficult for us, yet we seem unable or unwilling to change what we are doing.

I think it was Einstein who said something along the  lines of “Stupidity is doing something over and over in exactly the same manner and then expecting the outcome to differ!”

When things are not going the way that you want them to in life, something has to change.  The quicker we realize that and make the change(s), the quicker (and easier) it will be for us to get on with life.  Holding onto something and hoping that it will change, without us making any kind of change within ourselves, is just a waste of time.  The problem of course is that not only is it just a waste of time, but it is also a very negative and destructive course to take.

So I’m off to make a list of all the things that are not working for me and part of my goals for 2012 is to do things differently, make the changes and so ensure that my life going forward is easier, mellower and more rewarding.

What changes are you going to make?

Nikki is an Internal Auditor and Business Administration Specialist who can be contacted on 083 702 8849 or nikki@viljoenconsulting.co.za or http://www.viljoenconsulting.co.za