HABITS

DAY 30/30/30/JUNE/2020


HABITS

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. Habits are learned and unlearned. We are not the habits, hence we can change them.”

                                                    

                                                                                                                                -Unknown

It's easy to know about the good and the bad habits. We live in an environment where the good habits are constantly promoted while the bad habits rightfully criticised. At home everybody talks about them, yet we don't see all the children picking up on good ones. Probably the reason would be because of the sheer gap in knowing and doing.

It takes a lot of courage, discipline and consistency to cultivate habits. It's good to have a desire for good habits, however just a desire isn't sufficient at times. Look at the adjoining diagram. It talks about what is exactly required in order to develop the habit.

Three factors are extremely crucial in habit formation.



DESIRE (want to): It all starts with a strong desire. Is it something that ‘you want to’ pursue? Are you doing it by your own free will? Or are you doing it because people around you have been talking great about this habit. It's highly important to get an honest answer to this question. If we are saying yes to something out of peer pressure or obligation with the parents or teachers or fear of some powerful people around, mind you you won't pursue it for long. Even if you manage to make it a habit, it will make you unhappy. It's like living someone else's life. So choose something which ‘YOU WANT TO’ work on to form a habit.




KNOWLEDGE (what to, why to): You need to know the knowledge items for forming the habit. You need to ask a few questions like: ‘What do I need to learn? What resources do I have available to me?’ ‘Why do I want this change?’ Getting this item clarified will always support you in tough times when you go low on your motivation levels. Your ‘Desire’ and ‘Knowledge’ will always help you stay on track. It will become your intrinsic motivators.



SKILLS (how to): Once you have clarified that you have a strong desire to cultivate a habit along with the knowledge of the purpose and the resources available to you, the next is finding out the methods, processes, procedures of how to achieve the particular habit. A few questions you can ask yourself are, ‘What skills do I need to gain?’ ‘Who can teach me what I don’t already know?’ Getting clarity on the skills will help you have the right ammunition to support your quest for the new habit.


When these three elements intersect in the right way, the probability of forming a habit is quite high. At the same time, if any of the elements falls short, forming the habit can be quite challenging.


Yet there is one more strong factor which is a guiding factor in all these three areas. I feel that is ‘DISCIPLINE’. You would need that discipline to gather ‘KNOWLEDGE’ as well as the ‘SKILL’. Also, in order to clarify the ‘DESIRE’ you would need to be systematic in our approach of analysing as well.



Let’s try to explore it using an example.


I want to form a habit of writing.


DESIRE: It is my strong desire that I want to form a habit of writing. It is because it gives me a lot of pleasure, satisfaction and happiness when I write.


KNOWLEDGE: I want to develop the habit of writing as I want to use writing as a strong medium of expression for me. There are so many books and blogs available with free access to learn about this writing skill. There are so many mentors available in our social circles who would review what we write, help us, guide us in the journey. There are so many forums and groups like the ‘30 Day Writing Challenge’ whatsapp group that provides you a platform to write daily, consistently for thirty days. There are so many templates available to get started.


SKILLS: I would need to learn the language I am going to write in. I would need to improve my vocabulary in order to express better. I would need to read a lot of other authors and make observations. I need to study a lot of written material of others of various formats to develop a holistic thought process.


So with these three in place, I am all set to develop my habit well and internalize it life long.





© - Rahul Shinde 30/JUN/2020