The first few weeks of the New Year can be a difficult time on your "I'm going to make some changes" journey. You miss those self-defeating behaviors that gave you comfort even when the price you paid later was sufficiently painful to send you into 2002 with a commitment to change. So now is a good time to refresh your motivation. Here are some tips.

• 1. Be patient. Of course you want to see results quickly. But consider how long you practiced your self-defeating behavior, with gratifying lapses of life-enhancing behavior. Give yourself an equivalent length of time to put that process in reverse. Persistence, perspiration, short and long term goals can help.

• 2. Rediscover the pleasures of life. In the grip of a self-defeating behavior we sometimes lose site of the big picture that is the beauty of life. If you are despondent, reach out and help others and notice how much your view of life improves.
• 3. Move your body every day. Exercise is a desirable habit, not a chore. Use stairs instead of the elevator Walk rather than drive. Plan an active outing instead of a movie. Turn off the TV, turn on some music and dance your socks off. No one's watching.
• 4. Splurge on water. It is one of your body's greatest treats.Water is good for ever system of your body. the only downside of drinking too much of it is the calorie burning physical activity required for more trips to the bathroom.
• 5. Don't be rigid about your new way of life. It takes many lapses to make a relapse[comma] and many relapses to make a collapse. Use those times when you "fall off the wagon" to explore what happened before your motivation waned, and to proactively plan ahead for the next time that situation rears its ugly head.

One of the greatest things about life is that we have a choice every day to take advantage of opportunities to actualize our potential. Don't miss that opportunity. Your self esteem depends on it.