It’s the first month of the New Year and I’ve never thought of myself as the kind of person inclined to make New Year’s resolutions but lately I’ve been doing a kind of personal inventory of my life and realizing I want to make some changes.  We all have a mental picture of how we want to be perceived by other people—maybe as strong, or as intelligent, or charming, sophisticated, resourceful, mysterious and deep—something appeals to us about certain images and we want others to see them in us so, consciously or not, we promote those images and give them strength when we can.  What your sense of self looks like isn’t as important as the realization that you project one—sometimes overtly but usually subconsciously without really thinking about it.  Those tracks were laid down long ago and they’re now well-worn paths you navigate as if by instinct—like driving home from a long journey after too many hours on the road, you don’t always remember the particular checkpoints you passed on the route or the turns you took but you know you made them just the same as always because, lo, here you are at home thinking about not remembering that part of the trip.  It’s your personal mental auto-pilot.

The projection we make about our self-image also carries over into actions we decide to take or not take, behavior patterns we follow or don’t follow, and these are also usually less than consciously planned out.  But they bolster our desired self-image nonetheless.  There is a reason we do what we do, don’t do what we don’t do, and silently run through those subconscious scenarios when presented with conscious opportunities to change.  We all hear voices in our heads and lately I’ve been swapping out the old mental tapes I grew up with and their voice-over guy (who sounds remarkably like me) for a different voice in my head.  Where once the old tapes went off silently and automatically with mental lyrics I knew by heart in a voice I thought I knew to trust, now I’m listening actively and deciding if those lyrics still reflect a tune I want to be humming for the day.  And lately I’m trying to slow down the auto-play button and just concentrate on hearing the background noises and the little sounds that so often get muffled over and pass by so quickly I never get to hear them.  When I do, I’m recognizing a different voice-over guy in my head—a guy who sounds strangely similar to Dr. Phil—with a voice I can’t simply ignore.  Lately I’m expecting to hear my trusty and reliable “Yeah, but I just don’t do that” but when the sound comes through I’m hearing more of a Texas twang that sounds more like “How’s that been workin’ out for ‘ya?”  And lately the answer to the new voice has been saying things like “Not so well.”

I’m used to sitting down at the end of the year and using the time between Christmas and New Year’s Day to put the finishing touches on the business plan, to refine the lists of goals and objectives, and take a new look at the set of actions that will help goals and objectives be realized over the coming months.  I’ve often stayed in the office during that traditional vacation week while others went skiing or off to Maui or somewhere to visit family for just the purpose of using the quiet time you get while others are gone to finish off my thoughts about the coming year’s challenges.  But seldom have I extended those practices over to my personal  life and my plan for that beyond the workaday world.  This year I want to change that.  This year I’m making mental resolutions.  This time Texas twang Dr. Phil voice-over guy is in the band and turning it up to 11 and drowning out ‘old Chris’ voice-over guy whenever he tries to get a word in edgewise.  So far it seems to be working.

I want to work happier this year than last year—and that means working around real people every day rather than here from home and checking in by telephone once in awhile.  I want to appreciate what I accomplish more this year than last year—and that means performing more direct assistance to people where I know they are satisfied and pleased with the outcomes than simply selling someone the incremental widget and not knowing if they ultimately launched it, used it, benefited from it.  I want to be proud of the teammates I work alongside—and that means sharing the load and letting others take the lead and the bragging rights from time to time and carrying the load when they need a breather.  I want to support customers who want to be helped—and that means working with clients who already ‘get’ that what they had before wasn’t working for them and understand that changing is necessary (oh, hi there, Dr. Phil…).  I want to improve the level of conversation at home over our dinner table and have positive things to discuss and reflect upon instead of only complaints and frustrations—and that means not remaining in a toxic environment any longer.  And I want to say that I made a difference somehow—and that means redirecting a few of those old tracks and taking them in new directions where differences can still be made.

I don’t care about the title or the stature or even most of the typical things you’re supposed to care about when deciding where to work and what to do.  I just want to matter more to the people that matter.  How do you build that objective into your resume?

Every time I thought I’d got it made
It seemed the taste was not so sweet
So I turned myself to face me

David Bowie — Changes (1971)

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