This blog is written from the perspective of someone striving for self-improvement. When you tolerate mediocrity you get more of it. How do we become the 1% of the 1%?
Creatures of habit
I often wondered why some people find exercise easy and others find it hard. For a while, I was one of the lucky ones who found it easy. It wasn't a chore to go to the gym, it was something I anticipated with excitement and passion. Only a few years later and a hiatus in training did I start finding it a chore to get out and walk, run, or work out. Wasn't I someone who enjoyed exercise? How could that change?
It turns out, forming a new habit is uncomfortable. It requires a purposeful effort on the part of the individual. Going for a run is uncomfortable when not habitual. If you set a goal to walk 10,000 steps daily, you might find yourself missing a day, which turns into a week and so on. Eventually you decide that walking just isn't for you, until 6 months later you decide to get back into it, only for a repeat of the same.
IF you were to stick to your walking routine however, you would find after a while that you were heading out the door almost automatically, without thought or effort. Habits are stored in a different part of the brain than actions that require conscious effort.
Habits are stored in the basal ganglia, a group of nuclei located deep within the brain. The basal ganglia are responsible for automatic behaviors, such as walking, talking, and playing sports. When we perform an action repeatedly, the basal ganglia create a neural pathway that allows us to perform the action without consciously thinking about it. Actions that require conscious effort, on the other hand, are stored in the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that is responsible for planning, decision-making, and self-control. When we perform an action that requires conscious effort, the prefrontal cortex sends signals to the basal ganglia to initiate the action.
Success is actually a short race - a sprint fueled by discipline just long enough for habit to kick in and take over.
Take takeaway from this, is that once a habit is developed, it becomes a part of who you are.
You can become someone who enjoys the gym, or someone who enjoys reading etc. James Clear wrote, "The process of building habits is actually the process of becoming yourself." Once you decide on your values or principles - the type of person you want to be - you choose habits that would enable you to get there, and then cultivate them.
Forming a habit takes time. Studies show a wide range for this gestation period; 2 weeks to 9 months, and this varies on the individual and difficulty of the task being made habitual.
2 months (66 days) appeared to be the sweet-spot. As such, you can expect your new habit to be uncomfortable to perform for at least the first 2 months. You must accept and overcome this discomfort. After a while, you will reach a turning point as the new action becomes a part of you.
Purposely cultivate valuable habits
So rather than being the type of person just "does what they enjoy," what you can do is, become the type of person who enjoys doing things which provide value.
Everyone has the same number of hours in the day. Successful people are simply those with successful habits.
Delaying gratification
We are constantly making decisions today that we want to be better people tomorrow. The problem is that it's always today. When the time comes, we once again sell ourselves short. This pattern of decision making can continue indefinitely,
We need our rational self to win out over our impulsive self. Why is this so difficult?
I first discovered these ideas in The Science of Self-Control by Howard Rachlin;
1. We suffer from a distortion of perception. Lets think of how we perceive objects with our visual system for a moment.
The x axis here is our distance from both the moon and a tree at 2 points in time. the dotted lines show what the objects look like from these distances.
From afar, the moon looks small. The tree in front of it, similarly looks small. As we move closer, the tree takes up more and more of our vision until it appears much bigger than the moon, and the moon may even go out of sight entirely. Effectively, the moon, which is many orders of magnitude larger than the tree fades into obscurity.
We can think of our long-term goals and short-term desires in a similar way. From the vantage point of today, I can say I want to stop eating high calorie foods in the short term, to fulfill a longer term goal of losing weight. As time moves forward, however, my short-term desires become more and more apparent - so much so, that my longer-term values fade into obscurity.
2. Long term goals are abstract and intangible.
As the short-term desire approaches, it takes up more and more mindshare. It becomes very tangible. It's real. It's right there in front of us. Long-term goals and values are more abstract. They're out there in the abyss somewhere. We can't feel them just the same. As a result we discount the future heavily in favour of the present.
Strategies for success
Singleness of purpose
Multitasking is a lie. It's just a way to fail at multiple things at once. I firmly believe in dedicating yourself wholly to 1 thing. Now of course, we all want to achieve many things, be it losing weight, completing an education course, whatever.
Prime your state
but Tony Robbins introduced the concept to me more formally in Tools of Titans;
Ritualize the morning
Make a routine for your first 2-3 hours. Includes concepts from priming your state. Making your bed or doing pushups go into your morning routine.
Most Important Tasks
The task of breaking a bad habit is like uprooting a powerful oak within us. And the task of building a good habit is like cultivating a delicate flower one day at a time.
Be mindful of willpower
fleeting resource. can be depleted but refilled. Refilled by sleep or food or time. Depleted by decision making or stress or tired.
Meditation
Develop your relationship with discomfort
Other
Reset the room
Meditate
Cold therapy
Bibliography
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