Making changes in your life is great and it is the way we grow and develop as

people. Change is an ongoing process and part of being human. When you start any
change in your life you have to start from where you are. Unless you know where it
is, it will be quite difficult to make changes effectively. You have to start from
the baseline.

Starting with a baseline, it’s honestly about finding where you are? And what are
you doing? So that you know exactly what needs to be changed? It may sound strange,
but many of us are unfamiliar with what we do. When my clients tell me they want to
lose weight, the first thing I do is keep a food journal for a week to get a
baseline. The next week they share not only how much they were eating, but how
surprised they were to see what they were eating. Too many of us are on autopilot
and we just don’t know what we’re doing? When you track it – and it works with
anything – you have a real picture of where you are and what needs to be changed.

I once read a statistic that said most people consistently spend about 10% more
than they earn. I believe this to be true, and that is because spending, especially
on credit cards, is not tracked. I once had a customer who didn’t have enough time
to complete everything he needed to do. When she tracked her time for a week, she
was painfully aware that she was wasting hours and hours in front of the
television. The first step to change is awareness. Before proceeding you need to
know what you are doing. And where are you really? Keeping track for a week or two
will give you valuable information that will support your change effort.

Before you start any kind of change effort, you need to know where you are. I like
it with travel maps that have an X printed next to “You are here.” Unless you are
not aware of where you are? – and many of us have no clue that means no information
– so it would be impossible to make the necessary changes.

The first step in your change effort is to determine where you are. Keep logs for a
week or two. This will give you a realistic idea of what you are doing. You can
track anything from how much money you spend to the number of hours you sleep. Once
you know the truth about where you are you can move on? This is the basis of your
life.