Start Being Committed

We usually buy into what our feelings tell us and allow them to overly direct our actions and choices. 

Instead, notice the act of thinking without getting tangled in your thoughts. See your thoughts as ongoing attempts to make meaning of the world — give them power only to the degree that they help you. 

The mind's power over you is an illusion. For instance, say one thing while doing the opposite. You will find that it is possible to do the opposite of what you are thinking. (For example, type, I cannot type this sentence, while you are typing the sentence.) Regularly doing this exercise can give you more freedom to do hard things.

Once we realize that every moment is a gift, we will not waste it but use it intentionally, for something important and meaningful.

It is important that we set some clear priorities and create space for them. 

This exercise makes us value our limited time and sheds away the unnecessary activities from our day. 

We start living a vivid life, and slow down, becoming fully present in the moment, savoring time like a limited edition treat before it vanishes.

Anybody who is obsessed with the idea of being perfect will most probably end up having a major frustration. To put it simply, making mistakes is just natural for us, humans.

On the other, even though feeling ashamed for what you have done is quite upsetting, not taking responsibility or pretending to be someone you are not is way worse.

When making a mistake, some individuals find it extremely difficult to admit and apologize. This often leads to misunderstandings and even more tense relationships.

On the contrary, self-confident people will freely admit whenever they have made a mistake or have been wrong about something, as self development is possible only by acknowledging our own weaknesses.

• Create your environment, because it will affect your practice.
• As you start, set an intention for the ritual.
• Bring presence and full appreciation to the act.
• Rituals can be a space for contemplating what’s important to you.
• Close in gratitude for whatever you just did.

• Start your day with intention, gratitude and reflection.
• Email & messages: Transform them into a ritual of connecting to others, of carefully considering issues, of crafting language.
• Exercise: Bring it to be an act of love for your body, an act of connection to your environment, an act of full presence.
• Meditation: Make it a simple ritual of full appreciation for the moment.
• Sleep: Make it a time when you reflect on your day, prepare for your time of rest, slow down and appreciate your life.

• Sensory distractions (External): The things happening around us, like colleagues talking, phones ringing, people moving around us, music playing, etc.
• Emotional distractions (Internal): The thoughts that make our attention drift from what we’re doing. For example, remembering a phone call you need to make or thinking about a future meeting.

“It’s not the chatter of people around us that is the most powerful distractor, but rather the chatter of our own minds.”

When you don’t track your habits you’re more likely to talk yourself out of certain activities when you don’t feel like doing them. Tracking reminds and confronts you with your failures, effectively punishing you.

Tracking also gamefies your habits, providing extra motivation to being consistent. That sets a chain reaction of benefits in motion that starts to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

• You can use tracking apps, sheets or a journal to track your behavior.
• Decide which habits you want to track.
• Decide on a timeframe for tracking.
• Set a target for how many times you want to successfully follow each habit in your chosen timeframe.
• Decide on which days you want to do which habits, or even schedule it in your calendar.
• Mark successful and unsuccessful habit executions.

The last person you should ever have to censor yourself with is the person you love.

It’s important to make something more important in your relationship than merely making each other feel good all of the time. The feel-good stuff happens when you get the other stuff right.

Romantic sacrifice is idealized in our culture. 

Sometimes the only thing that can make a relationship successful is ending it at the appropriate time, before it becomes too damaging. And the willingness to do that allows us to establish the necessary boundaries to help ourselves and our partner grow together.

“Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.”

No matter how much enthusiasm we have for the goals, taking on even just two habits at once is setting ourselves up for failure, because greatly increases the difficulty of sticking to it.

Pick only one habit to change and devote all of your energy to that, and once it’s on autopilot, move on to the next one.

1. Recognize that you’re in the wrong mental state. It’s not likely to lead to a calm focus. It will lead to you doing busywork or seeking distraction.
2. Experiment to find a set of actions that can help you move into the right mental state. This is going to be different for each person, but with some experimentation, you can discover things that work for you.

• Meditation
• Go for a walk
• Get up and move around
• Talk to someone (if you’re worried about something)
• Having a cup of tea
• Taking a power nap
• Having a cup of coffee (differs for each person)
• Getting into a quiet, uncluttered environment
• Turning off your wifi router
• Using full-screen writing apps
• Playing calming music
• Reading an inspirational quote or article
• Talking to someone (including a therapist, if needed)
• Bringing playfulness to the task