How to Sell Yourself on Lifestyle Change

 How to Sell Yourself on Lifestyle Change

It’s coming up on that time of year again. You know, the time where you seriously commit to the same resolution that you seriously committed to last year… before life got in the way and it evaporated into thin air.

Depending on who you ask, up to 85% percent of all New Year’s resolutions involved some element of lifestyle change, be it weight loss, exercise, better nutrition, improved life-balance or more sleep. And, of those, nearly 50% have been broken by the end of January, while 90% bite the dust by June.

Problem is, just saying you want to do something isn’t enough to make it happen. You need to literally¹ sell yourself on the need to make it happen, then create a plan and set up a support and accountability structure.

Selling is an art form, even when we’re selling ourselves.

This is especially true when the actions that would lead to the result being sold are viewed as unpleasant, i.e., exercise and diet. So, let’s take a lesson from legendary² master of persuasion³ and 7-figure copywriter and marketer, Dan Kennedy.

In his book, The Ultimate Sale Letter, Dan reveals a highly-effective 3-step sales process:

Problem: Identify the problem or need that is not being satisfied

Agitate⁴: Stir up the problem to make it more present, more inflamed⁵, more painful and more in need of immediate⁶ resolution

Solve: Present a solution, a way out of the pain

It’s pretty easy to see how this 3-step process might work when trying to sell someone else, but we can also use it to sell ourselves on actions that we often view as unpleasant in the name of losing weight, getting fit, de-stressing, improving our health or just being able to do more with our lives.

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Here’s how to sell yourself on lifestyle change:

Problem: Rather than just resolving to change some behavior or accomplish some goal, take a step back and define the problem that you are trying to solve by accomplishing your goal or resolution. Put another way, ask what’s important about achieving your goal/resolution or what’s wrong that you’re trying to fix. For example you might want to:

Rebuild your confidence - you feel bad about yourself when you look in a mirror and want to feel better.

Get off medication - high blood pressure is making you feel sick and the medication you take to control it kills your energy.

Recapture your inner-calm - stress is making you so anxious, you’re on medication to control it.

Get horny - don’t want to have sex anymore because you feel so self-conscious about your body.

Agitate: Once you’ve gone past a general desire to attain⁷ a result and defined the problem that the result will fix, it’s time to drill-down a bit and do some agitating⁸. This is not the most-enjoyable process, because, when it comes to lifestyle change, it almost always requires you to do two unpleasant things: (1) face the present as it truly is and (2) visualize⁹ the future, should you stay on your current course. For many, neither is an appealing exploration. So, rather than agitating the problem, we do the exact opposite and avoid or minimize it so we don’t feel uncomfortable. The problem is that it is this very process of agitation¹⁰ and discomfort¹¹ that serves as a huge motivation to take action. It brings our pain to the surface and gives us the opportunity to take action to remove ourselves from it. Looking at our first example above, we’d build on our disgust looking in the mirror and ask two more questions:

First, we’d ask the ‘what’s important’ question again to try to get to a deeper motivating force. In fact, we might ask it a few times until the motivational onion is fully¹² peeled.

Then, we’d ask what our lives will look like 5, 10, 15, 20 years down the road should we choose not to make any changes.

Take the time to write out your answers in as much detail as possible.

Solve: This is where we finally get back to your original resolution, recommit to a specific goal and then take the step that almost nobody takes: make a plan of action. Take out a calendar, choose a start date and write down the exact actions you will take every day for the first 30-days to make your goal your reality. If you need help with this step, get it. Items on that plan might include joining a gym, seeing a nutritionist, hiring a trainer, finding a therapist or joining a team. Then, tell someone close to you about goal, the underlying¹³ reasons for it and your plan. Give them a copy of your plan and get their commitment to ask you about it every day for 30-days to provide a level of accountability.

Using the classic three-step method to sell yourself not only on lifestyle change, but on the very actions that will create it is a powerful step in making this year’s resolutions different than next year’s.

As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts, ideas and additions in the comments below.

1 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

2 legendary   

adj.传奇（中）的，闻名遐迩的；n.传奇（文学）

参考例句：

• Legendary stories are passed down from parents to children.传奇故事是由父母传给孩子们的。
• Odysseus was a legendary Greek hero.奥狄修斯是传说中的希腊英雄。

3 persuasion   

n.劝说；说服；持有某种信仰的宗派

参考例句：

• He decided to leave only after much persuasion.经过多方劝说，他才决定离开。
• After a lot of persuasion,she agreed to go.经过多次劝说后，她同意去了。

4 agitate   

vi.(for,against)煽动，鼓动；vt.搅动

参考例句：

• They sent agents to agitate the local people.他们派遣情报人员煽动当地的民众。
• All you need to do is gently agitate the water with a finger or paintbrush.你只需要用手指或刷子轻轻地搅动水。

5 inflamed   

adj.发炎的，红肿的v.（使）变红，发怒，过热( inflame的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• His comments have inflamed teachers all over the country. 他的评论激怒了全国教师。
• Her joints are severely inflamed. 她的关节严重发炎。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

7 attain   

vt.达到，获得，完成

参考例句：

• I used the scientific method to attain this end. 我用科学的方法来达到这一目的。
• His painstaking to attain his goal in life is praiseworthy. 他为实现人生目标所下的苦功是值得称赞的。

8 agitating   

搅动( agitate的现在分词 )； 激怒； 使焦虑不安； （尤指为法律、社会状况的改变而）激烈争论

参考例句：

• political groups agitating for social change 鼓吹社会变革的政治团体
• They are agitating to assert autonomy. 他们正在鼓吹实行自治。

9 visualize   

vt.使看得见，使具体化，想象，设想

参考例句：

• I remember meeting the man before but I can't visualize him.我记得以前见过那个人，但他的样子我想不起来了。
• She couldn't visualize flying through space.她无法想像在太空中飞行的景象。

10 agitation   

n.搅动；搅拌；鼓动，煽动

参考例句：

• Small shopkeepers carried on a long agitation against the big department stores.小店主们长期以来一直在煽动人们反对大型百货商店。
• These materials require constant agitation to keep them in suspension.这些药剂要经常搅动以保持悬浮状态。

11 discomfort   

n.不舒服，不安，难过，困难，不方便

参考例句：

• One has to bear a little discomfort while travelling.旅行中总要忍受一点不便。
• She turned red with discomfort when the teacher spoke.老师讲话时她不好意思地红着脸。

12 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

13 underlying   

adj.在下面的，含蓄的，潜在的

参考例句：

• The underlying theme of the novel is very serious.小说隐含的主题是十分严肃的。
• This word has its underlying meaning.这个单词有它潜在的含义。