Do routines sound relaxing to you? The comfort of knowing what’s coming around every turn so you can spend part of your day on autopilot? What happens if routines get too easy and comfortable? Maybe instead of comfort, you identify with: Up at 6:30AM, coffee by 6:33AM, Shower, drop-offs, work, meetings, dinner, sports, laundry, exhaustion, BEEP BEEP BEEP. Has your life become too predictable? Has autopilot removed the sheer enjoyment of living? Are you in a rut? No need to worry, you have the opportunity to take back the control to re-engineer and redesign your day.
So..Maybe it’s time to shake things up a bit. We can all fall into habits that no longer serve us. When we bare down and keep digging faster instead of smarter, we get a BIG hole and have possibly lost track of where we’re going.
You can think of autopilot has a handy time and skill saving friend. Something to take over and make sure you get to where you are going with consistency and timing. OR you can see autopilot as denial keeping you in a routine for longer than necessary. It’s just, “what you do”, “second nature”, you’ve “made your bed”. WHAT? No! Never accept mediocre, never accept less than you deserve, never settle for what you know now.
Live is about challenges. Challenges that we encounter in our lives and life that we chose to challenge. Take on the stigma, the faulty perception, the inherited belief system and push back. Your life and your routine can change every day if you want it to.
The first step is admitting to yourself that you have a problem with your current quality of life, then identifying what and where, and THEN and only then, you make a change. There is power in hearing but empowerment is in DOING.
I read an article by James Clear, author, entrepreneur, and photographer who studies and writes about human behavior. That article is titled: How To Start New Habits That Actually Stick.
Your life today is essentially the sum of your habits.
How in shape or out of shape you are? A result of your habits.
How happy or unhappy you are? A result of your habits.
How successful or unsuccessful you are? A result of your habits.
What you repeatedly do (i.e. what you spend time thinking about and doing each day) ultimately forms the person you are, the things you believe, and the personality that you portray.
There is a four-step pattern that is the backbone of every habit, and your brain runs through these steps in the same order each time. The cue triggers a craving, which motivates a response, which provides a reward, which satisfies the craving and, ultimately, becomes associated with the cue. Together, these four steps form a neurological feedback loop—cue, craving, response, reward; cue, craving, response, reward—that ultimately allows you to create automatic habits.
It sounds so simple, doesn’t it? Nope, life is complicated and human behavior is never predictable. And remember, you are ever-changing so just because you didn’t see it before, just because you haven’t taken the control that you now know you have, doesn’t mean you can’t reroute, and redesign your day. James Clear just taught us that motivation comes for the habits we form. Unsatisfied with your routine and the habits that YOU’VE created, time to make a change.
Ready for sooner rather than later? Have we directed the light into the corners of your denial only to find a routine rut?? Maybe your routine is dictated by time. You might feel everything you are doing now, within a 24-hour cycle is of the utmost importance and if you could squeeze out a few more moments you might be able to change the design of your day.
Ready to get out of the rut? Re-evaluate your goals and update your wants and your needs. You might be stuck in a routine trying to get somewhere that you don’t even want to go anymore. Routine ruts can prevent us from seeing new opportunities. Routine ruts can falsely keep us in our comfort zones never letting us stretch ourselves. Routines can keep us from finding our purpose and reaching our true potential.
CHALLENGE: Recognize the rut and ask yourself, what’s next. Don’t get comfortable with the same-o same-o. Push yourself to reevaluate and set your sights on a new direction. Make tomorrow the day you try something new and then GO!
I Know YOU Can Do It!