Anytime you make a commitment to yourself or someone else, and you do not keep it, there is an eroding effectt on your self esteem. In today’s podcast Mat and Summer talk about the importance of this idea. It may sound too easy, but in our experience, the keeping of commitments is one of the fastest and most sure ways to give yourself a self esteem boost.

This is not a one time fix however. You have to continue to keep commitments for the effect to remain with you long term.

We talked about how, like most decisions we make, we need to weigh out the options and potential consequences of each and then decide and not look back.  I know her well enough that I knew if she didn’t take this opportunity to go to China now, she’d never have that opportunity again or she wouldn’t think she deserved to do that again. I also know that she would come back and continue with her education anyway so why not go?  She has struggled with self-esteem issues for awhile yet she is completley amazing!  She too, felt like that was a good choice for her but she was nervous to choose it and needed validation.  I gave it to her

My thoughts:  go with the choice that has the best consequences for you and others.

*Summer

With that in mind, Summer and I thought it would be a good idea to talk about being consistent.

How can being consistent in doing the little things change your life? Listen and find out.

How can being consistent in who you are make your life easier? Listen and find out.

First and foremost we want to congratulate Summer and her husband. Summer had triplets on the 30th of December! Wow, three kids all at once,, life will never be the same.

With Summer at the hospital, I am alone in studio for this episode of the podcast.

The topic is New Years resolutions and goals.

“Aimlessness is a vice, and such a drifting must not continue for those who would steer clear of catastrophe and destruction” – James Allen

Setting goals keeps us from aimlessly wasting our time. Take some time to set some goals that will stretch you and will help you grow and develop as a person.

]]> http://teenesteemcouncil.com/new-years-resolutions-bah-goals-for-the-new-year-yeah/feed 1 http://teenesteemcouncil.com/2-tips-to-help-the-procrastinating-student http://teenesteemcouncil.com/2-tips-to-help-the-procrastinating-student#comments Wed, 07 Oct 2009 13:12:01 +0000 Mat Edvik http://teenesteemcouncil.com/?p=542

Do any of these sayings sound familiar?

This year I am going to keep up on all of my homework.

This year I am going to stop procrastinating.

I am going to turn in every assignment

It is the middle of the first quarter of school. If you are like me when I was in school, then you haven’t kept up on those simple commitments. It is so easy to fall back into old habits, especially when it comes to school work.

I learned a couple of techniques while I was in college that helped me to change. Instead of just saying that I was going to get better grades, be more consistent, and stop procrastinating… I was able to do it.

Hopefully you can implement these techniques before you get to college. The two major techniques are:

Do a little bit each day

Whether it is a big paper or just keeping up with your daily math homework if you can discipline yourself enough to do a little every day you will avoid the stressful situation of trying to get it all done in one night. If you write a few paragraphs, or a page, of a big paper every day, then you will feel a sense of accomplishment rather than the sense of dread that comes with knowing that you have a big assignment that you haven’t started on. The work will be of a higher quality as well.

Turn work in on time, even if it is not totally complete

There is a disclaimer that I want to put on this technique. Sometimes it is better to turn in something late and make sure it is really high quality, but only if the teacher does not dock you points for late work, or if you only have 2 out of 50 questions answered. Otherwise it is better to turn in what you have and get credit for it. When you turn your work in, even if it is only mostly complete there are a couple of things that happen.

You are psychologically able to move on to the next assignment. When you turn in an assignment to be graded you stop using mental energy to think about that assignment that is not done yet. You are then able to use that mental energy to work on the next assignment. You can put all of your attention on making the next assignment the best it can be.

You avoid having the build up of assignments that you have to finish. Having tons of late assignments that you have to finish is really taxing on your motivation. You may feel that you are so far behind that there is no use trying to catch up. That may be true, but if you can develop the habit of turning work in when it is due, even if it isn’t totally complete, you will be able to avoid that situation in the future

If you apply these two techniques you will be on your way to becoming the A student who used to get C’s.

Because we didn’t hit too much on the junior high age, I wanted to address these years and getting ready for them. So below I wanted to list just a few ideas for each year:
7th grade: this grade is often the hardest for many people, especially girls. Here we have just left elementary school and maybe had a great group of friends and maybe was even popular and then we go into a new school with lots of new people and our identity or perception of ourself often changes and sometimes it isn’t just our perception of ourselves but it is sometimes also our friends perception that changes.
We often meet a lot of new people this year and this can be so fun but also really stressful.  MY ADVICE:  talk with everyone at first.  Make yourself known by a lot of different groups of people.  Don’t be so stressed that you get lumped into a group you may not really want to be a part of.

8th grade:  This is probably for most junior high age girls the funnest.  You aren’t the youngest and you aren’t the oldest either.  So you can have friends in all different grades which makes it a lot of fun!  By now, you pretty much know who you are for the moment and are sure of what you like and who you like to spend most of your time with.  This is also a great year academically to get on the ball with practicing to NOT procrastinate.  Next year’s grades count and it’s good to get into a good habit of studying and doing your homework on time.

9th grade:  Socially, this is often a struggle for girls since a lot of the guys their age are not looking at the 8th and even 7th graders to hang out with.  So, have so much fun with your girl-friends and maybe meet guys from different schools this year.  This is a year that is full of decisions.  You need to choose what you might want to be a part of in high school like a certain club or team.  You’ll need to realize that not all your close friends will want to do the same things which often makes it tricky to decide.   But, join something and get involved, no matter what your friends want to or don’t want to do!  Study hard and keep working on your schoolwork – don’t get behind for even a day or two; it isn’t worth it!

Hope some of this info helps!

*Summer

I also would like to teach a principle that is key in helping us establish truth and reality.  Any time you aren’t liking the way you may be feeling, ask yourself – “what am I thinking about?”  Chances are that you are probably thinking the same way you are feeling.  Basically – if you want to change your feelings – change your thinking or at least ’tweek’ it a little to match how you want to feel.  Next is the question then, how do I change my thoughts?  If you want to change your thoughts or thinking, sometimes you’ll need to change your environment.  Now I don’t mean just your physical environment meaning where you are at the time.  Sometimes that helps for sure but rather the emotional or social environment that you are a part of at the time.  Sometimes our emotions are directly linked to where we are and who we are with.  So again, change your feelings by changing your thinking and change your thinking by changing some aspects of your environment.

Let me know if you have any questions about that.  This is something that I am constantly doing myself and sharing with others too.  Good Luck as always

*Summer

I watched many of them throught the weekend and watched how some completely changed their attitude and outlook.  What I realized is that most of them were able to change their attitude and outlook because of who was in their group; both for the negative and for the positive.   I’ve talked before to you and showed the youtube video about the power of influence but today I just wanted to mention the power of example. 

Test the theory very simply:  walk into a room with a smile and see how people respond to you and then walk into a room blank faced and see if there is a difference.  Talk to your parent(s) in a grumpy way about something and then talk to them with respect and kindness another time and see what difference it makes for them and for you.  I’m really interested in testing this theory so when you do it- email me or leave a comment and let me know what you thought.

*Summer

I watched a movie a few years ago called Crazy/Beautiful with Kirsten Dunst.  In that movie is one of my favorite lines from the man who plays her father.  He is unhappy about her choices in her life and unhappy with who she is as a person.  He says to a friend of her character, “It’s taken me a long time to accept the kind of person she is and the kind of person she’ll never be.”  Some people might hear that and say, “that is so rude and cruel to say about someone you love” but the way I took it was that this father had worked on accepting who his daughter really is – the good and not so good in her.  He loved her so he accepts her; no matter what!

Do you do that for yourself? How about others?  Can you accept all things in you and in others around you?  One of the things I think we struggle with the most is accepting both our inside (and even harder) our outside appearance.  I have another quote that I found years ago.  It is by an unknown author: “Acceptance of others, their looks, their behaviors, their beliefs, bring you an inner peace and tranquility–instead of anger and resentment.” 

I love that quote!  To me, that is the way to avoid anger and resentment as well; but the acceptance isn’t just for others–it is primarily for ourselves.

*Summer