TODAY’S IDEA:
“Make rituals, not resolutions.”
— From Faster Than Normal: Turbocharge Your Focus, Productivity, and Success with the Secrets of the ADHD Brain by Peter Shankman. (Read an excerpt here.)
Whether you make new year’s resolutions or you simply resolve to do something any time throughout the year, you have probably experienced failure in that arena. Resolutions fail so much because, while well-intentioned, they are little more than wishful thinking. Rituals work because they become ingrained habits that lead us to the successful outcome we want.
In Peter Shankman’s words: “It’s a process—and not one that comes easily. It takes work, determination, focus and repetition. You need to know that you’re going to fail on occasion. But the end result is worth it, and the trick is to constantly focus on both how you feel when you do it and how you feel when you don’t.”
Peter has a simple four-step process to create rituals:
- Create a ritual that produces positive feelings for you
- Work backward from the reward to set the steps in place to make you succeed
- Build fail-safes, that is, processes in place so that if something fails, some other thing (a reminder, a process, or whatever else works for you) will kick in to help you continue to build your habit/ritual.
- Visualize yourself achieving the goal for which you are building this habit.
But remember that simple does not mean easy, because this is about building a new habit. The key is not to give up if you break the initial streak of continuity and consistency, that’s what Peter refers to as failing on occasion. Yes, you will be out with your friends and keeping up with your diet until you eat the double chocolate fudge ooey-gooey brownie with ice-cream and sprinkles. Don’t beat yourself up, just enjoy it and make sure you learn something from it. Could it be that the diet food is making you hungry and unsatisfied? Maybe you need to change to another diet or eat to satiety more of your allowed foods. Could it be that you are simply tired and your reserves of willpower are depleted? (See this idea). Maybe you can go to brunch or lunch with your friends as opposed to dinner. Use failure as a time for analysis and growth, as opposed to a time for being angry at yourself. Remember Einstein’s quote: “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
ACTION:
Commit today to start creating a ritual that will help you achieve a desired goal. What will your ritual be? How will it help you actualize one (or many, why not?) of your goals this year? Can’t wait to hear about this!