But when we began talking about how he should change his attitude and behaviour to implement the ideas we had previously agreed on, things started to go downhill. This was when the rational approach was replaced by the emotional response and all the reasons why he couldn’t/shouldn’t change his behaviour came to the surface. Unfortunately, when it comes to a contest between emotions and rational responses, it’s a pretty good chance that emotions will win out.

All this serves to remind us that changing our behaviour, even when we know that change is necessary, is often difficult. We need motivation, commitment and perseverance. We need to be committed emotionally if we are going to be able to stick with the changes, even when the going gets tough. This lack of emotional commitment is probably the reason that so many of our good New Year resolutions don’t last past February.

Retirement presents us with a great opportunity to make some changes to our personality which will make us better people to be around. Some of our work characteristics like “driven, ruthless, a workaholic etc” are not character traits that are going to make us attractive company in retirement.

If you really want to make changes to your attitudes and behaviour, you need to understand that it will require more than just wishing that the changes would happen. It will require determination and perseverance. So it’s often better to work at introducing change in smaller, achievable steps, rather than setting big goals which will be very challenging.

For more go to www.mylifechange.com.au.