My Dogs Do Not Recognize Daylight Savings Time

This weekend was the dreaded day of setting our clocks ahead an hour.  Oh, the horror of loosing an hour. Whatever.

 

Even worse having to actually, physically change all the clocked that are not electronic and do it on their own.  I normally forget to reset one of the manual ones and don’t figure it out until a couple weeks later.

 

This change seems to get everyone up in arms and very grumpy.  But the one thing that is not affected by the time change – dinner time for the dogs.

 

My dogs know nothing about springing forward and falling back – they know that at a specific time in the evening their bowls are to be filled with the crunchy stuff.  They don’t care what the clock says, they don’t care if you are in the middle of anything – it is their time – period.

 

It is like extreme habit.  No matter what the circumstance they have this inner voice or clock that at that time goes off like an air raid siren.  You try telling them that dinner time has changed.  It is like, as my friend Nancy said, trying to describe the smell of the number nine.

 

I wish I had that same internal drive for some things.  Like working out, eating healthy or keeping a immaculate house.  No matter what the circumstance I would just be able to hop right out of bed at some ungodly morning hour and work out.

 

I’m still waiting for that to happen.  That, and to grow another five or six inches taller, world peace, every single sock being matched with its partner right out of the dryer and Shemar Moore to deliver the winning lottery check with my name on it to my front door.  A girl has to dream.

 

In the meantime I have to practice what I preach.

 

When coaching clients during job searching we talk about setting goals, habits and actions. There is no sense taking action without setting a goal.  You must know what you want and they what you are willing to do about it.

 

Rarely is there a goal that doesn’t take work and come with an element of pain.  You may be uncomfortable talking to people about your job search, but without networking you will be missing out on some of the most important opportunities.

 

Once you start tackling those painful steps then they more easily become habits – but that doesn’t mean that they become natural.  They just become easier.

 

Not in a sense that you have done it so often that it is old hat; rather in a sense that once you have done it consistently for a bit you can look back and see progress.  You already have that positive reinforcement so that helps get you through on the days that you just don’t want to.

 

With that in mind, the treadmill and I made friends again today.  I will never have the internal drive at 5 am to pop out of bed and work out; however, I can condition myself to get up a little earlier by looking back to feeling winded after playing with the pups and to where I will be in being able to outlast them.

 

You may never be completely at ease talking to complete strangers about what you can do and how you can help them, but you can get enough practice that it is far less painful that it was when you started.  You can also find that you made a friend or two along the way and possibly even a new job.

 

 

Lisa K. McDonald, CPRW

Career Coach-Strategist

Certified Professional Resume Writer

Career Polish, Inc.

www.CareerPolish.com