1 – Do you listen to yourself?:
Before we start talking about how to implement new healthy habits let’s start by considering the result of continuing to follow unhealthy habits.
Ayurveda understands that we must consciously and continuously seek a state of balance. Though even looking for a state of balance is to be taken with a pinch of salt as Ayurveda comes with a clear awareness that the elements within and around us are in constant evolution due to factors such as season, age, time of the day etc. This means that it is inevitable that we will once in a while become imbalanced. That said it is still important to thrive towards keeping in balance and harmony with our own bodies, mind and environment, aiming towards a rough equilibrium physically, mentally and emotionally.
We do this using wisdom and intuition. This being the last week of our course we’d hope to have learnt some of the basic tools of Ayurveda to our advantage – or have been reminded and re-considered with more focus some elementary principles of good health.
Think about something you know deep down to be best for you like going to bed early or starting the day on a good note rather than check your phone first thing or avoiding snacking throughout the day and late at night.
We all go through periods in life when we are truly ignorant of what is ideal for our body and mind. We either haven’t gained the knowledge or just dulled it through lack of sleep, stimulants, alcohol, busyness, abuse or keeping wrong company. But when we become aware of our deffective choices then we can tap into our inner knowledge. We have the opportunity or even power to create a new future, to do something differently and evolve to a better habit.
Do you always though?
Or do you sometimes know with absolute certainty what is best for you then go out and do something else instead? We’re all guilty of ignoring our intrinsic wisdom and intellect. In Yoga and Ayurveda this is called a crime against wisdom. The Sanskrit word is Prajnaparadha. Prajna quite literally means direct insight into the truth and paradha means opposition. To make a choice that is detrimental to yourself can threaten your state of balance and health. Simply put if you gorge yourself on chocolate or alcohol and then suffer indigestion or a hangover you have committed a simple act of Prajnaparadha. But obviously it can get a lot more serious than that. Nature will find ways of reminding you what is ideal for you or clearly not as the case may be. This might manifest through getting sick or just a general feeling of discontent and disharmony.
Crimes against wisdom happen everywhere all the time. Ayurveda does not in any way preach to fanatically follow healthy habits 100% of the time, in fact quite the opposite, it advises a relaxed effort and a comfortable approach towards the ideal lifestyle.
However, if you can’t take a hint you’ll be sure to receive another one just that much louder, and louder again until the small discomfort becomes a full blown disease.
“A strong and clear intention is needed if you are going to succeed in making positive changes in your life.” Margot Anand. Our intention here is to build energy, vitality and vibrancy. So keep that in mind.
2 – Make your new habit fun for you!:
So the word habit comes loaded with association to boredom as our hearts sink just at the thought of it. However if we talk about habit changing as evolutionary progress then we’ve got back a feeling of adventure and journeying towards a better, grander life. My teacher, Cate Stillman, invited an external speaker on her course to talk about habits, his name is James Clear and you can google him for inspiration. One of his first piece of advice, which brings the fun back into habits, is this: “The key to building lasting habits is focussing on creating a new identity first. Your current behaviours are simply a reflection of your current identity. What you do now is a mirror image of the type of person you believe that you are (either consciously or subconsciously). To change your behaviour for good, you need to start believing new things about yourself.”
So basically, the key to approaching your new selfcare rituals is to approach each one with the spirit of challenge and adventure.
Consider each habit change an “experiment” in which you are the crazy little scientist in your home Lab, trying that new formula for results. Keep a spirit of curiosity as you experiment with your diet and habits. This change of perspective keeps the light bulb going, it’s fun, it makes you want to try.
The new regimen is aimed at giving you more spark so it is vital to keep this in mind to make the process of getting there fun for you. Other ways to make it fun are:
– doing it with someone, going through the experience of changing your habits together might allow for some laughs here and there as you share stories
– rewarding yourself for doing it, giving yourself a profit of some sort a recompense/premium for achievement
– focussing on making the new habit enjoyable as you’re doing it as much as after you’ve done it. Slowing down to enjoy the activity and look at it positively in a way to make it a pleasant experience, using your senses to be fully embodied in that moment with your attention on satisfaction and pleasure
Nadya Andreeva in her book Happy Belly talks about changing habits “the loving way”. In that sense we’re gently walking the bad habits out of the door and lovingly inviting the new ones in to the party.
“By degrees a person should become free of unwholesome and unnatural habits; similarly, one should try to develop wholesome natural habits. The way of doing this is to replace the unnatural with the natural. If withdrawal is gradual, addiction does not reappear; wholesome habits, gradually acquired, become firmly implanted.” Charaka Samhita
To conclude on that front I also want to quote Deepak Chopra who coined the expression “joy as the foundation of energy”. I think this is completely and utterly key to what we are trying to achieve here. All the practices here on our course are meant to bring you joy and there’s no denying that joy has that power to release deep energy into the body and mind. So watch your joy and foster new routines through joyful attention to them. Joy fosters more joy which fosters energy. In Deepak’s words “growth is the foundation of survival”. If you are not progressing and evolving for the best then you are procrastinating and on the way to decay. New healthy practices bring growth, which leads you on. We are focussing on wholeness, being whole again and cultivating an atmosphere of growth. Feeling happy that we are making things better, learning new things, getting more energised and stronger.
If your strategy is to make your new habit powerful then with that intention you might want to practise it every day. Gertrude Stein said “Anything one does every day is important and imposing.” So in my humble opinion if you do the deed every day, it will become influential and take roots in a strong way. A task done every few days will not feel so significant or have the same efficiency.
3 – A word or two about will power:
Serge Kahili King, a Hawaiian Shaman, talks extensively about habit forming in his book Mastering The Hidden Self. Firstly he explains that habits are usually formed at the level of the unconscious where our deeper self forms habits based on expected gains. According to him our subconscious, contrary to what we might expect, is very practical and very result driven. A habit usually has taken anchor around a real or perceived gain. With this in mind he carries on to explain that to discard a habit alone is a very tall order indeed however replacing a less desirable habit with a new more positive habit and persuading our subconscious of the similar or even grander benefits of the new habit is where we get a hook. The key is to convince the subconscious that whatever gains it enjoyed from the old habit will also be gained from the new and perhaps more. To illustrate, take the case of going to bed late because you feel it gives you time for things you enjoy doing and space for activities that must be done. The winning practise is to fully take on board how going to bed early will allow you to wake early which will give you tons more fresh energy and enthusiasm and all the time you need for your to-do list, cooking, breakfast with family or friends, that much enjoyed yoga class or workout out, space to meditate and re-connect with yourself to start the day from a feeling of “full” (I mean nurtured) rather than rushing around like a headless chicken wondering where you’ll be able to cut out some time elsewhere in your day for these “tasks”.
I’ll follow with a quote from the book about will power: “As anyone who has tried to change a habit knows, just making the decision to change is not enough. Many people try this and then get discouraged when the old habit keeps coming back. Here is where another definition of “will” helps to explain what is needed: “a strong and fixed purpose; determination”. Determination, an unswerving will, is actually the continuous, conscious directing of attention and awareness toward a given end for a given purpose. And this is accomplished by continuously renewing the decisions or choices made to reach the given end, in spite of apparent obstacles and difficulties.” In other words there is no such thing as a strong will power or weak will power. Will is will, what a person can do is to consciously chose to re-apply that will over and over again. Real failure is not falling down, real failure is falling down and not getting up again. It doesn’t take any effort to use our will. If you feel that using your will is an effort it’s important to relax, actually relax your muscles or tension in your body then start again. The effort that some see in using will power is just tension in the body, a little stress which causes muscle tension. Breathe and relax, and try again. If you’ve missed the mark and not followed your new habit for a day, try again the next day with a gentle relaxed attitude.
Another easy tip to support in this idea of will power is to set the bar low to start with. If you chose one practice and decide to do it for one week for a small amount of time you exercise your habit and if you become very successful at something small, over-achieve with this simple task even, then you can slowly but surely bring the bar up and higher, and increase your expectations. You can push yourself more little by little until you reach the final target. You start modestly and work up to a bigger challenge. You protect and strengthen your ability to change with tiny habits and slowly accumulate to a big triumph. Gretchen Rubin says that “habits grow strongest and fastest when they’re repeated in predictable ways.” And if the task feels overwhelming you have a better chance of success chipping at it in small batches.
4 – Gretchen Rubin’s Four Tendencies
self-knowledge and particular personality traits may influence how you introduce and stick to new habits. We’ll talk about this in reference to the Doshas in a moment but I would like to dive into the subject using Gretchen Rubin’s Four Tendencies from her book Better Than Before, What I Learned About Making And Breaking Habits. It’s a very helpful pamphlet by the way, if you feel called to read it – some of her ideas you may recognise in this lesson. For now I want to take a few minutes going into her theory about tendencies in relation to shaping new habits. So she has this idea that there are 4 types of people:
The upholders – these guys are the doers. They’re the type who always want to be clear on what is expected of them either by other people or by themselves and just go and do it. They meet the expectations, both outer and inner expectations. They will take the bull by the horn and get the job done. What they thrive on is clarity of objectives and to know that something is expected of them. In that way they may love habits because there’s no agonising about whether to do something or not, no willpower involved. This isn’t to say that they prioritise what others expect of them to the expense of what they expect of themselves (that’s another category) but simply that they like to be proactive and they thrive on habits and routines, in fact they love habits!
The questioners, the 2nd category, are those who will question expectations until they conclude that they make sense. They resist outer expectations and meet inner expectations. Only then will they apply themselves to make the changes expected. They resists rules for rules sake, anything arbitrary, however if they understand the benefits and good standing of what is expected then they will make the space for things to change.
The obligers come next, they are motivated by external accountability (which is helpful following our last point). So these people love to meet their responsibilities, and to follow external demands and deadlines is more important to them than inner expectations. In other words, they meet outer expectations and resist inner expectations. They struggle the most with self-motivation. Consequences such as deadlines, late fees, external judgement drives them but they are more likely to drop habits that are good for them if someone call someone on them for something else. It’s easy for them to do things for others but not so easy to do things for themselves.
Finally the rebels are those who resist all expectations, whether outer or inner expectations. It’s the control they dislike most. They don’t do well achieving what they are “supposed” to do. On the other end, they are driven towards their own goals, in their own way. Gretchen Rubin uses the word unshackled spirit which I quite like to explain how they resist authority and oppose anything that they may be expected to do however they will do well if they channel their energy in constructive ways for bettering themselves and to support life choices that are important to them. In fact talking about choice, they will far more like to make the same choice every day (using their right to chose, again and again) than decide once and for all to do something every day for the rest of their lives which will sound like a death sentence to them.
So whilst we know we don’t all behave the same with forming habits and keeping with them, the conclusion is simply that knowledge is power and if you know how you tend to operate then you can use that knowledge to good use to handle shaping these habits and following up on them. The solutions are different for different people. You must know your own nature and what abits best serves you, what method will help you change your habits. It’s up to you now to take responsibility to understand your own workings and how best to deploy a strategy that works for you. Armed with the tools to see yourself you can tailor a suitable action plan.
5 – Accountability (or not) via a side point on self-knowledge to shape habits
Many people, but not all, are more successful at crafting new effective habits when they are accountable to someone else as they start to practise their new ways. So first of all you need to be clear on whether that works for you or not (knowledge of your dosha – and whether it is aggravated or not- may very well enlighten you as to why you do well with accountability or why you don’t). Self-knowledge will give you clues as to whether this one is for you or not. You must know yourself to shape your habits better and identify how your nature affects your habits. Many Vata and Pitta types, especially if aggravated, may very well resent accountability and want to do their own thing without having to report to any other authority. However if you do enjoy the community interaction that accountability brings then working in a group or with another person may be your key to achieving your goals. Again some Vata’s and even Pitta’s will thrive with that and certainly Kapha’s would do well to pair up. No man is an island as they say and you’ll derive great benefits from sharing your thoughts and insights with someone that can keep you on track and walk the talk with you. Exchanging with someone will help you keep the momentum going and help your self-command.
Accountability is the opportunity to really engage with others whilst supporting each other in the transition of changing habits. By reporting on your progress and bouncing back from others feedback and suggestions, sharing advice, experiences, talking about your stumbles and successes you are getting crucial support to help you change in a positive way, especially if that support is not available in your usual social network. I strongly advise you to post on our Facebook page and start conversations or even pair up and chat with one another, in fact we’re going to do just that in a minute, over the phone. And to talk through how the course has been for you, what’s worked and what hasn’t. If you’re struggling with an aspect of the material you can ask me questions or talk it through with someone on the course.
Of course if you’re not the type and just want to run for the door at the sound of being accountable to anyone about your progress then feel free to take the benefits of the course and work through it in your own time and space. Just for this week’s conference call though I’d be very grateful if you could give a few minutes of your time to speak to another student on the course as I will pair you up for a quick check-in.
6 – Scheduling little and often leads to success
This is a bit loaded because it brings more than one argument together.
First we look at Scheduling Quality over Quantity – a little, gradually but regularly is proved to be more efficient than going all at it once a week. And the way to implement this is simply by scheduling, actually freezing your diary for the activity of your choice. Blocking the time in your agenda and fixing the pattern of behaviour by making an appointment of it reinforces the decision and simplifies the choice for you so that you can take on the new routine without stress or fretting about what to do or when to do it. It makes life easier and you may very well find comfort into doing the same thing daily at the same time, especially if you suffer stress or feel overtaxed already. We are capable of making changes in our lives and the secret is basically to break things down into small steps or even tiny steps in fact and spend time every day taking action. Successful transformation is built with the fundamental rule of little and often. You transform into a person full of energy by making gradual changes and improvements towards more positive habits. You achieve positive impact chunk by chunk, that is breaking down your new healthy routine into bite-sized chunks so as to establish your new daily practises with manageable upgrades. The life coach Carole Gaskell calls it “exercising your life-changing muscles regularly “. By that she means taking positive action frequently to create steady progress. If you worry about having enough time for your new habit just think that scheduling regular habits speeds time because again you don’t have to think about it, you just do it. The experience shortens. On the other end when habits are interrupted and the brain needs to engage in choices and new information then it takes longer to get anything done. Little and often is about sustainability and manageability.
Or do you prefer the excitement and energy flow of a big transformation? You call the shots.
In that vein it’s crucial to give the word scheduling all it’s power too. We often fool ourselves that we can do it all if we get the right balance, and then things start falling by the wayside. Scheduling means two things, first clearing out the space for the new opportunity and second it means choice, it means that if you schedule an activity at a certain time then you are not available for anything else. And that’s how you lock yourself into a new way of being. Sorry I am never available on a Tuesday after work because that’s when I’m taking my yoga class. Ant that’s that. Don’t cancel, don’t rearrange. The people that are in your life to stick will soon know that that time for yourself is precious, and who knows they might start joining you.
Scheduling can be made easier if you tie one activity to another existing one such as meditating on waking up, or straight after breakfast for example. This way you embed the ritual into your day, anchoring it to your existing schedule.
7 – Monitoring
I’ll keep that one brief as I think we have plenty of material to keep us going but I just thought it worthwhile to mention monitoring as a good tool to stimulate your new habits. In that sense you’d monitor the results of the habits, how you feel, hopefully better and much more energetic. Also monitoring might be important to track how much you are really putting in to your new habits. We easily delude ourselves. Oh yes I’ve done this… once this week it turns out. If you monitor the daily routines then you can motivate yourself to do more and also get a strong sense of the link between your new daily habits and your energy levels.
8 – Start now
Another quick one, start now. Not next week, not when you feel less tired tomorrow, or less stressed because that’s exactly what these new habits are for. Not after the holiday. There is never a better time to start than right now. Anything you tell yourself otherwise is an excuse to not do what’s right by you today. You wanna do what’s right by you don’t you? Now is the time to make a commitment to yourself.
Self-control
Grit and perseverance
recurrent practise
Other techniques
RESOURCES
Gretchen Rubin: Better Than Before, What I Learned ABout Making And Breaking Habits
Piers Steel, procrastination expert’s website http://www.procrastinus.com
Namaste,
Anne
Evidence-based + Holistic 