And now for the star: Resolve.
Some may think him unnecessary, perhaps a bit too subtle to be the star. But they would be wrong. This role is necessary and as we’ll see, deserving of top-billing for his special talent of mitigation and manifestation.
You see, there has be a link between the mental and the physical in behavior change. I’m not just referring the synaptic gap that continues to confound the sciences. But in philosophical terms a physical manifestation of the mental goings-on is important to being a good human.
For me, resolve is what clicks in your body that ‘causes’ you to get up and go to the gym on any specific day. That “just-right” mix of potassium and sodium. Or a little less laboratorically the ‘doing the deed ‘(even if done dirt cheap).
Therefore our previous model can be adjusted as follows:
Behavior Change happens through -> Motivation (the mental: why you want it) -> Manifested by Resolve (the transition from the mental to the physical) -> by means of Discipline (the physical: action – repeated consistently over time).
Dan Millman has a nice take on resolve from book The Way of the Peaceful Warrior:
“Neither resolutions nor understanding will ever make you strong. Resolutions have sincerity, logic has clarity; But neither has the energy you will need. Let anger strengthen your resolve.”
I would put a slight tweak to this and insert discipline instead of anger to strengthen your resolve. The motivation and resolve needs to result in discipline. However both motivation and resolve reciprocally rely on the act of discipline as a tangible output and eventual reinforcing factor.
So let’s plunge in to the philosophy of this character.
Resolve is an authenticity or an existential good-faith. In a sense resolve is what permits us to be true to ourselves or allows us to experience the failure that is being human.
If we have the motivation and know the discipline but yet fail to have resolve we fail in effort. This is an obvious experience to all living things, but strikes us particularly in the emotional experience of: disappointment, frustration, anger, shame, or embarrassment.
Basically we deceive ourselves by not acting according to ourselves.
This is the bad-faith part. Bad in a well-functioning human sense. For these emotions are often the genesis or resultant bullshit response we tell ourselves in attempts to alleviate the discomfort of these emotions. Not good. Bad.
However, If we have our protagonist, resolve, we then act in accordance with ourselves (motivation/discipline) and all is in alignment. This is good (hence good-faith). And this is why resolve deserves such accolade. It’s really the most important part to our well-being. I don’t think I’m over-stating this. Even if our efforts fail, having resolve enables us to dies with all weapons drawn. We’ve given our best efforts and are not left with the very disturbing thought “I could have, should have done more.” That sucks because you know something directly related to the failure, that is your fault, that didn’t have to the case (it was up to you), that cannot be undone.
In a lighter sense resolve is accountability (to self, arguably the most impotent kind).
When we put out in to the world a desired behavior change, we’ve done something.
And if we know the starting point (intellectual knowing: motivation) and the ending point (experiential knowing: disciplined behavior) then I would argue we have a certain obligation to ourselves to act. And unless we change our intellectual understanding or come to realize we do not possess the what/how of discipline; in order to act in a coherent, good-faith manner, we need resolve. Bad-faith is not a desirable place to be with ourselves (or with others).
I also mentioned authenticity. I think this concept very much overlays with good-faith. Although stated understanding of authenticity seems to vary (annoyingly widely by our influencers) a key aspect seems to be being our true selves. And unless we start off with a lie (and we really don’t want the behavior change we claim to want) then in order to be fully true to ourselves we need to enact behavior accordingly.
Perhaps authenticity happens along a continuum of more or less authentic. Even so it would seem more authentic is the desired vs. less. And more authenticity calls for more coherence (intellectually, emotionally and of course behaviorally) to a more developed self-understanding.
So get out there and Get After It – It being all the good shit: authenticity, good-faith, coherence, alignment; behavior change.