Building a Meditation Habit - Atomic Habits Style

For the last two weeks, I have tried building a meditation habit. The previous attempt didn’t sustain for long. Turns out that sitting quietly for 15 minutes every day with your eyes closed and not thinking of things is incredibly difficult. So this time I applied James Clear’s methods from his book Atomic Habits and tried to build a system around it.

“If you’re having trouble changing your habits, the problem isn’t you. The problem is your system. You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.”

Why do I care about meditation? For the simple reason that I feel better after. In my work as a poker player, I need to make a lot of quick decisions repeatedly for hours. And whenever I played after meditating, I felt like I had just a wee bit more time for every decision. There’s also plenty of science behind its benefits. Our brain physically changes as we meditate, especially in the parts involved in monitoring our focus and self-control.

Now, on to the methods. I am going to use a lot of examples of exercise as a habit because that’s something I’ve become good at. Direct quotes from the book in Italics

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CHANGING THE IDENTITY

The ultimate form of intrinsic motivation is when a habit becomes part of your identity.

When I tried to quit smoking, I read Alan Carr’s Easy Way to Stop Smoking. One of its two key points was to believe you are a Non-Smoker. Not that you have quit, or you are someone who smokes sometimes. But you are a non-smoker.

It’s like being a Vegan. Either you are, or you are not.

Similarly, if you want to create a new habit, you have to become that person. For me, if I am trying to build a meditation habit, I have to start thinking that this is what I do - I meditate daily. There is no I have to or I should. It’s natural.

The word ‘Identity’ itself comes from two Latin words Essentias meaning being and Identidem meaning repeatedly. So our identity is nothing but our repeated beingness.

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THE 1ST LAW: MAKE IT OBVIOUS

The Techniques:

1. The Implementation Intention or The Trigger - It is a plan that we make beforehand about when and where to carry out the activity. The format is:

   I will [BEHAVIOR] at [TIME] in [LOCATION]

2. Habit Stacking - Have you ever noticed yourself going on a shopping spree? That tendency of one purchase leading to another is called The Diderot Effect. Habit Stacking capitalizes this tendency by using an existing habit as a trigger for the desired habit:

   After [CURRENT HABIT], I will [NEW HABIT].

3. Environment > Motivation - Redesigning our environment does much better to change our behavior than Motivation (which is an exhaustible resource). Two key points in this:

   • Use visual cues as catalysts for the new behavior

   • Try a new place where you haven’t tried the habit before.

My Adaptation:

In the last year, my exercise habit was triggered by setting the dishwasher. It was a specific and actionable trigger. For meditation, my trigger would be finishing lunch. Post-lunch is often the period when I am most lethargic. And feeling the lowest during the day. Meditation can hopefully help solve both problems.

Adding Meditation just after Lunch

For the environment, I am going to use my balcony which already has a Buddha painting hanging there. The combination of a new place plus the visual cue should do its job.

My Trigger + Habit Stacking:

‘After I finish lunch, I will meditate on the balcony for 15 minutes.’

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THE 2ND LAW: MAKE IT ATTRACTIVE

The Techniques:

1. Temptation Bundling - Using a habit that we are tempted to do as a reward for an activity we should do. The anticipation of our WANT habit drives the NEED habit. For example, I browse Twitter in breaks between sets during my workout. The Formula:

   After [HABIT I NEED], I will [HABIT I WANT]

2. The Effect of People - I took up Intermittent Fasting because I had a friend who did it successfully. That same friend quit smoking after I did. The people in our lives affect our habits immensely.

   One of the most effective things you can do to build better habits is to join a culture where your desired behavior is the normal behavior. The shared identity begins to reinforce your personal identity.

3. Motivation Ritual - It’s like putting on music before a big game/an exam/a workout (all of which I do). Even if you are not motivated beforehand, the ritual itself drives the motivation up.

My Adaptation:

Combining Temptation Bundling with Habit Stacking:

1. After Lunch, I will meditate for 15 minutes on the balcony

2. After Meditation, I will make a cup of tea and have Monaco

As for having people around, I don’t yet have a meditation partner per se. So if you would like to share some insights, I’d love to hear. Meanwhile, I am also going to hang around on Reddit Meditation subs.

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THE 3RD LAW: MAKE IT EASY

The Techniques:

1. Walk slow, not backward - Not being able to do a complete workout every day is fine as long as we do at least a little bit - say 5 push-ups. As long as we put in a rep, however small, it works. Lost days hurt more than successful days help. So maintaining a streak is critical.

   One of the most common questions I hear is, “How long does it take to build a new habit?” But what people really should be asking is, “How many does it take to form a new habit?” That is, how many repetitions are required to make a habit automatic?

   Habits form based on frequency, not time.

2. The law of least effort - Prime your environment for future use. Like keeping your morning workout clothes out the night before. Two more ideas:

   • 2-minute rule - Downscale your habits until they can be done in two minutes or less.

   • A commitment device - Like buying a better mattress for sleeping. Or signing-up for an automatic savings plan.

My Adaptation

I am not looking to meditate 30 minutes every day. I’ll start small for 15 minutes. Even 5 minutes will work.

Usually, after lunch, I lie down for a bit. So I can squeeze in a quick meditation then. Either I’ll be gone into a siesta or I’ll be able to meditate - both reasonable outcomes.

As for priming environment, I don’t need it right now. But if the habit doesn’t work, I will buy a meditation cushion, or a candle or a meditation bowl.

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THE 4TH LAW: MAKE IT SATISFYING

The Techniques

1. Instant Gratification - Our brain is wired to be biased towards immediate reward than by the possibility of even a bigger reward in the future. Hence we need to feel immediately successful for a habit to stick - even if it’s in a small way.

   The key is to select a reward that reinforces your identity rather than conflicts with it. So don’t reward yourself with ice cream after a workout. Instead, allocate money for a weekly massage. It reinforces the identity as someone who takes care of their own body.

2. Habit Tracking - What doesn’t get tracked, doesn’t get done. The habit stacking + habit tracking formula is:

   After [CURRENT HABIT], I will [TRACK MY HABIT].

My Adaptations:

• My cup of tea + Monaco biscuits serves as Instant Gratification. If it doesn’t work, I will consider creating a Spa fund or Travel Fund.

• I use Insight Timer which automatically tracks my habit

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Parting Notes

“Men desire novelty to such an extent that those who are doing well wish for a change as much as those who are doing badly.”

— Machiavelli

I have to remind myself to fall in love with the boredom of doing the same thing over and over again. To look for novelty in repetition. It is an opportunity to delve deeper inside our own minds. It can even be therapeutic - like a runner, putting one step after the other in endless laps.

Hope this was useful to you. If you like this article and want to hear more from me, you can leave your email address below. I’ll let you know whenever I write something new.

Read more articles here or go to the Start Here section if you’re new to the site.

First Of The Day

When I woke up this morning, I had no intention of sending you this article. The idea had not even occurred to me. What happened was that after waking up, I made myself a cup of coffee and started journaling. Nothing ground-breaking right? Except that it is. Allow me to explain.

For the last couple of years, my days have all begun in a similar fashion. After freshening up, I open my balcony door, unroll a yoga mat, and exercise. It is a habit that I've cultivated with a lot of effort and I've seen results (like losing 10kgs or running my best ever 5k which happened yesterday!). Skipping it and doing something else today is a big deal for me. Because that means that I am risking breaking a great habit. Why am I doing this?

It's because of Change in Focus.

Earlier, the focus area of my life was getting fitter and healthier. So I would plan my day around it. That would mean exercise in the morning, long evening walks, and planning meals for the day in advance. I would do my work in the time gaps available instead of the other way around.

I’ve become good at this habit. I genuinely love the process of working out. It has become my unconscious competence*. But now I want to shift my focus towards something else, hence the change.

*Sidenote: Four levels of competence are: Unconscious incompetence, conscious incompetence, conscious competence, and unconscious competence. When we learn a new skill, these are stages we cross until it becomes a natural part of us.

After 5+ years of playing poker professionally, I am now exploring new areas - writing being one of them. For that, I need a clear block of uninterrupted time to do deep work. So today when I woke up, that was my number one priority. Hence the early morning journaling.

I call this First of the Day - Do the most important thing in your life first thing in the morning. And by most important, I mean the singular area of focus in your life. It is by no means a new concept. But getting to discover it yourself sure is a revelation.

Examples of focus areas and how you can use this:

• Learning - Start your day with a non-fiction book. Take out 30 minutes for it.

• Mental Health/Mindset - Start with art. Meditate. Journal.

• Relationships - Take an early morning walk with your person. Discuss your dreams - both literal and figurative. Cook breakfast together.

• Exercise - Do it first thing, before checking your phone. Do it before breakfast (I've been working out on empty stomach for years now. It's tough at first, but you get used to it. Have a banana or an apple if you want).

• Health: Plan your meals for the day. Cut all the veggies and fruits beforehand. Take action when you are fresh so that you don't give in to temptations when your willpower (and glucose) is low later in the day.

We are not doing this just to get it over with. It is so that our well-rested brain can work to make the subliminal connections that might otherwise be missed when we are exhausted.

By the end of the day when we are tired, it requires more bending of will to do the same thing. Take this article for example. I wrote the first draft in one smooth stretch of time in the morning. But then it took me a tremendous amount of effort to edit and make a finished product later in the day.

Recognizing our peak performance periods and slotting the most important work in that time is a crucial skill. And I've found that doing this just for 2 weeks can be enough to move it from conscious incompetence to conscious competence.

Let me know if it works for you. And if you want to hear more from me, leave your email address below so that I can let you know whenever I write something new.

Notes from Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World

Here's an exercise: Count the number of times you are interrupted while reading this article. And when I say interruptions, I mean all of these things and more:

• A colleague coming over for a quick question

• A ting on your phone

• New email notification on the corner of your screen

• The sudden craving for a quick cup of coffee

• Opening up a new tab and doing internet wandering

These interruptions may seem harmless, but they have a significant impact on the quality of our work, productivity and consequently on our life. The book Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport explores this idea extensively using solid research.

Some of the concepts in the book should be intuitive knowledge to us. But I've found that when such knowledge is backed by scientific studies, it becomes much more likely to be adopted in real life. (Like the benefits of meditation and why I started doing it after reading about its very real benefits).

This post covers my notes and highlights from the book. Passages from the book are in italics.

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WHAT IS DEEP WORK

Deep Work: Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.

If we look back in the past, we’ll find that deep work was ubiquitous in influential people. For example:

Mark Twain wrote much of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in a shed on the property of the Quarry Farm in New York, where he was spending the summer. Twain’s study was so isolated from the main house that his family took to blowing a horn to attract his attention.

This is not an isolated example. The book Daily Rituals by Mason Currey is full of such stories of important historical figures who owe their success to commitment to deep work.

Newport says that our behavior - ‘our’ as in most knowledge workers - is in sharp contrast to this. And he ascribes the reason to network tools and the proliferation of shallow work.

Shallow Work: Non Cognitively demanding, logistical-style tasks, often performed while distracted. These efforts tend not to create much new value in the world and are easy to replicate.

If we look at our usual work day, a lot of the deep work is replaced by the shallow alternative - like the constant sending and receiving e-mail messages like human network routers, with frequent breaks for quick hits of distraction.

Larger efforts that would be well served by deep thinking, such as forming a new business strategy or writing an important grant application, get fragmented into distracted dashes that produce muted quality.

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WHY DEEP WORK

The Deep Work Hypothesis: The ability to perform deep work is becoming increasingly rare at exactly the same time it is becoming increasingly valuable in our economy. As a consequence, the few who cultivate this skill, and then make it the core of their working life, will thrive.

Our work culture’s shift toward the shallow is exposing a massive economic and personal opportunity for the few who recognize the potential of resisting this trend and prioritizing depth.

This opportunity will become more apparent in the coming years when the artificial intelligent tools will take over more of our shallow (and some deep) tasks.

The real rewards are reserved not for those who are comfortable using Facebook (a shallow task, easily replicated), but instead for those who are comfortable building the innovative distributed systems that run the service (a decidedly deep task, hard to replicate).

Assuming that you agree with the deep work hypothesis, we'll need two core abilities for thriving in the new economy: 

1. The ability to quickly master hard things.

2. Theability to produce at an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed.

And this is where Deep Work will come handy.

1. DEEP WORK HELPS YOU QUICKLY LEARN HARD THINGS

To understand this, we'll get into the science of focus. I found it to be the most fascinating part of the book. A few things to learn:

Myelin: It is a layer of fatty tissue that grows around neurons. It acts like an insulator that allows the cells to fire faster and cleaner.

What are Skills? Skills, intellectual or physical, eventually are a function of our brain circuits. When we focus intensely on a specific skill, we essentially force the relevant circuit to fire repeatedly in isolation.

And this is how the two are connected:

The new science of performance argues that you get better at a skill as you develop more myelin around the relevant neurons, allowing the corresponding circuit to fire more effortlessly and effectively. To be great at something is to be well myelinated.

By focusing intensely on the task at hand (or in other words, by using a specific circuit repeatedly), we trigger cells called oligodendrocytes to begin wrapping layers of myelin around the neurons—effectively cementing the skill. Instead, if we are distracted, we fire too many circuits simultaneously to be able to isolate the group of neurons we want to strengthen. It follows that - 

To learn hard things quickly, you must focus intensely without distraction.

 

2. DEEP WORK IS RARE

A few examples of why in today’s work culture deep work is rare:

1. Open floor offices - My last job was in at a very cool company with good perks, flexible vacation policy and an open floor office. But, that last bit was problematic. Ringing phones, laughter, discussions - all these traveled farther in an open layout. I had to find a meeting room just to be able to focus and do some deep work.

2. IM in offices - ‘Coffee?’ ‘Smoke?’ ‘Yo what’s up?’ Simple questions which take not just your attention but also your time - The office instant messenger problem.

3. Social Media presence - The effects of the attention sinks that Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, et al are has been well documented. This problem is more pronounced in the case of creators who not only have to do their deep creative work but also engage in the shallow work of keeping their social media updated since they also use it as a channel of promotion.

These cause a problem which you might have heard before:

Attention Residue - When you switch from some Task A to another Task B, your attention doesn’t immediately follow—a residue of your attention remains stuck thinking about the original task.

It implies that the common habit of working in a state of semi-distraction is potentially devastating to your performance. It might seem harmless to take a quick glance at your inbox every ten minutes or so. But that quick check introduces a new target for your attention. The attention residue left by such unresolved switches dampens your performance.

 

3. DEEP WORK IS MEANINGFUL

Here's something perhaps you can relate to:

It can be hard to define exactly what a given knowledge worker does and how it differs from another: On our worst days, it can seem that all knowledge work boils down to the same exhausting roil of e-mails and PowerPoint, with only the charts used in the slides differentiating one career from another.

At my work, some days would be spent in meetings with little output. Other times I would use my busyness as a proxy for productivity. It brewed dissatisfaction and a lack of purpose.

Newport quotes Winifred Gallagher, a scientific researcher in the field of focus:

There’s a gravity and sense of importance inherent in deep work. Gallagher’s theory predicts that if you spend enough time in this state, your mind will understand your world as rich in meaning and importance.

By contrast, shallow work begets discontentment.

Human beings, it seems, are at their best when immersed deeply in something challenging. To build your working life around the experience of flow produced by deep work is a proven path to deep satisfaction. Whether you’re a writer, marketer, consultant, or lawyer: Your work is craft, and if you hone your ability and apply it with respect and care, then you can generate meaning in the daily efforts of your professional life.

A deep life is a good life, any way you look at it.

4. DEEP WORK HELPS YOU PRODUCE AT AN ELITE LEVEL

Consider this equation:

High-Quality Work Produced = (Time Spent) x (Intensity of Focus)

Newport gives example of a prolific professor who often isolates himself without distraction on a single research task. During these periods, which can last up to three or four days, he’ll often put an out-of-office auto-responder on his e-mail so correspondents will know not to expect a response.

If you believe this formula, then Grant’s habits make sense: By maximizing his intensity when he works, he maximizes the results he produces per unit of time spent working.

This idea of working smarter, not harder has been explored in multiple other books and articles. And it seems to make a lot of sense.

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The second half of the book is used to lay down the Rules and the Techniques by which we can attain deep work in our life. To give you a short summary of those techniques is just not possible because there's too much information to be compressed in a succinct form.

The aim of this post was to introduce you to the concept of Deep Work, to show the solid foundation behind it and how profound of an impact it can have in our lives. I hope it has served its purpose.

I'd highly recommend you to read the book. You'll get a stronger understanding and hopefully you implement some of those rules in your life. I’ll leave you with one last advice from the book, which I feel is the simplest to implement and probably the most powerful.

 

RITUALIZE

The key to developing a deep work habit is to move beyond good intentions and add routines and rituals to your working life designed to minimize the amount of your limited willpower necessary to transition into and maintain a state of unbroken concentration.

Your will, in other words, is not a manifestation of your character that you can deploy without limit; it’s instead like a muscle that tires. You have a finite amount of willpower that becomes depleted as you use it.

Without structure, you’ll have to mentally litigate again and again what you should and should not be doing during these sessions and keep trying to assess whether you’re working sufficiently hard. These are unnecessary drains on your willpower reserves.

“Men of genius themselves were great only by bringing all their power to bear on the point on which they had decided to show their full measure.”

-Antonin Sertillanges, The Intellectual Life

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If you want to read more on the topic of focus, here's something I wrote: A Romantic's Guide to Finding Focus

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The Priming Effect and Making The World A Better Place

A couple of months ago, a friend recommended to me the book Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Laureate. It’s an intriguing read so far and serves as useful small talk topic. But, I wanted something more from it than just watercooler conversation. So, I’ve used some of the insights from the book and applied them to the cause of improvement of our daily lives.

This is the second post in the series. Words in italics are taken directly from the book. You can read the first post here: Ego-Depletion and Why Having a Job You Like Matters

PRIMING

If you have recently seen or heard the word EAT, you are temporarily more likely to complete the word fragment SO_P as SOUP than as SOAP. The opposite would happen if you had just seen WASH. 

This is a Priming Effect. The idea of EAT primes the idea of SOUP, and WASH primes SOAP.

Priming effect takes many forms. If EAT is on your mind, you will recognize the word SOUP quicker if it is spoken in a whisper or written in a blurry font. You will also be primed for other food-related ideas like hungry, cookies, ice cream. If you ate at a wobbly table, you will be primed for 'wobbly' as well. Like ripples in a pond, priming spreads across a network of associated ideas.

Priming is not restricted to concepts and words. Even your actions and your emotions can be primed by events you are unaware of. In an experiment, young students were asked to assemble a four-word sentence from a set of five words (for example, "find he it yellow instantly"). For one group, half the scrambled sentences contained words associated with the elderly, such as forgetful, bald, gray, or wrinkle. After this, the students were sent in an office down the hall for the next task. That short walk was the actual experiment. The time it took to cross the hall was measured for each person. The students who had formed a sentence from words with an elderly theme walked down the hallway significantly slower than the others.

This experiment involves two stages of priming. First, the set of words primes thoughts of old age, even though the word 'old' is never mentioned. Second, these thoughts prime a behavior - walking slowly, which is associated with old age. Afterwards, when the students were questioned, they insisted that nothing they did after the experiment could have been influenced by the words. So, this effect happens without us being aware of it.

This priming phenomenon - the influencing of an action by the idea - is known as The Ideomotor Effect

If after reading the earlier paragraph, you wanted a glass of water, you would have been slightly slower than usual to rise from your chair - unless you dislike the elderly, in which case you might have been slightly faster than usual.

Reverse Ideomotor effect also holds true. If you were walking slowly, you would tend to recognize words like old, wrinkle, or bald faster. So, the age-old advice of smiling in the moments of adversity is quite useful. Just like amusing thoughts make you smile more, smiling more brings amusing thoughts. Acting like you are calm is likely to be rewarded by actual tranquility.

PRIMING IN OUR CULTURE

In another experiment, few volunteers were asked to construct a sentence from a selection of money related words ('high a desk salary paying' became a high-paying salary'). Other primes were introduced like a stack of Monopoly money on a table or a computer screen saver with dollar bills floating in the water. The results of this experiment were astounding:

1. Money primed people became more independent than they would be without the associative trigger. They persevered longer to solve a difficult problem before asking for help, clearly showing increased self-reliance.

2. Money primed people were also more selfish. They were much less willing to help a fellow participant who was confused about a task. When someone dropped a bunch of pencils on the floor, money primed people helped pick fewer pencils. 

3. They also showed preference for being alone. Money primed people placed their chair farther apart from others than the ones who weren't primed.

These findings present a profound inference:

In a culture where we are constantly reminded of money, it is shaping our attitude and behavior in ways that we are unaware of and of which we may not be proud.

Another common portrayal of this priming effect is in dictatorial societies where the ubiquitous portraits of the national leader not only convey the feeling that 'The Big Brother Is Watching' but also lead to a reduction in spontaneous thought and independent action.

Some other common priming examples:

1. Reminding people of mortality increases the appeal of authoritarian ideas. 

2. Uniforms are the anti-prime of creativity.

3. Thinking of stabbing a co-worker in the back will make you more inclined to buy soap or disinfectant  than juice, candy or batteries (Feeling that one's soul is stained triggers a desire to clean one's body).

You could react to these studies by disbelieving them. After all, we are all rational beings who think logically and are not affected by such trivial manipulations. But, the fact is that the results are authentic; they are not statistical flukes. The conclusions are true, and more importantly, they are true about me and you. If we were exposed to a dollar bills screensaver, we too would pick up fewer pencils to help a clumsy stranger.

MAKING THE WORLD A BETTER PLACE

I find the effects of priming astonishing. The profundity and width of its implications in our lives makes my head spin.

The simple act of reading the newspaper in the morning can affect the quality of our day. If you look at the majority of the front page news, it is sensational and often depressing. This is probably the worst way to start your day. It primes us to being more pessimistic and drains out energy for positive action. And as we found earlier, this happens without us being conscious of it.

So, does that mean that we should ignore all the negative happenings of the world? No. What it means is that we should ignore the inconsequential negative stuff. For example, do we really need to read about two celebrities bitching about each other. It doesn't add value to our lives, in fact, if were to accept the priming effect, it is going to make us meaner and drive us to the edge.

I remember an incident a few months back. It was late at night and I was checking Twitter about an event that was shaking up the world. I can't recollect what it was, but safe to say, it elicited extreme reactions from people. And, I was aghast  at the negativity surrounding the event. Random people were writing searing comments and I felt angry just by reading them. I took note of my rising heartbeat and promptly closed the app. Was the mass hysteria necessary? I doubt it.

Gossip, sensationalism and negativity like this is Antifragile ( ref. Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb ) - our attacks on them increase their resilience to obscurity. If we instead chose to deny it our acknowledgement, it will die of its own accord. 

So, can we collectively decide to tone down the frequency of discussions around negative incidents? Instead, why not talk about culture bearers, the ones who move our society forward? For example, instead of talking about a sexist comment by some celebrity, let’s talk about stories of women who have done something outstanding by breaking their traditional boundaries. By doing this, we are not ignoring the women who were disrespected in the first incident. But, we are choosing to bring change by showing the good (priming) instead of condemning the bad. 

If our parents read more stories of people taking unconventional paths, they might find it easier to accept your idea of quitting the job and traveling the world. Or, if we are amazed by a cannabis community celebration ( YouTube Link), perhaps it is time to share our own happy weed stories.  

END NOTES

Based on everything we read so far, 'Be positive' becomes not just a hippy mumbo-jumbo but a practical motto with real effects on our lives. Surround yourself with settings which would encourage the behavior you want to demonstrate. So, instead of reading news in the morning, I listen to good music and exercise. And then, to prime me for writing well, I read a nice book.

A lot of our decisions are impulsive and driven not by a rational, thought out process but by our whims and fancies influenced by external factors. So, if we want our decisions to make us better human beings, shouldn't we put ourselves in situations that make us the best version of ourselves? And if we all decide to do that, the world might just become a better place.

A final suggestion: Try out the priming effect on your own. Perhaps do a small experiment like not reading the newspaper in the morning for a week. Or, starting the day with upbeat music. See for yourself if it makes your day better. And let me know how it goes.

There is a very recent article on Slate which tells a different story on the priming effect. Here's where you can read it: Sad Face

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Read Next: A Romantic's Guide to Finding Focus

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Ego Depletion and Why Having a Job You Like Matters

A couple of months ago, a friend recommended to me the book Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Laureate. It’s an intriguing read so far and serves as useful small talk topic. But, I wanted more from it than just watercooler conversation. So, I’ve used some of the insights from the book and applied them to the cause of improvement of our daily lives.

Thus far, I have read only a quarter of the book. So, I think this could be a series of posts. We'll see about that when we cross that bridge. 

 

Ego-DepletioN

‘An effort of will or self-control is tiring; if you have had to force yourself to do something, you are less willing or less able to exert self-control when the next challenge comes around. This phenomenon is known as Ego Depletion.’

This means that if you are involved in cognitively challenging tasks, especially the ones which you don't want to do, you would be more susceptible to give in to your urges later. An example from the book: Suppose I ask you to remember a sequence of 7 digits for a couple of minutes. And you are told that this is the number one priority for you. If at the end of two minutes, you were asked to choose between a virtuous fruit salad or a sinful chocolate cake, chances are you would choose the cake. 

In a demonstration of the concept, a group of people were asked to stifle their emotional reactions after watching an emotionally charged movie. This group then performed poorly in a physically draining task immediately after. The emotional effort of the first half of the experiment, reduced their ability to sustain physical pain and they gave in to their urge to quit more quickly.

 

Why having a job you like matters

An important implication of the concept of ego-depletion is that the kind of job you do, and how you feel about it dictates the rest of your day as well. An effort of will or self-control is tiring. So, if you are forced to work at a place you don't like, chances are that after coming back home, you might eat more junk food, watch more senseless TV and indulge lesser in creative interests.

For example, a friend of mine who hates her job enjoys painting. But, she found that after coming back home, she had little drive to do the one thing she loves - paint. She would scroll her Facebook feed endlessly, or watch movies and not feel good about it. Ego-depletion is in part a loss of motivation. The ego-depleting job reduced her desire to engage in creative pursuits (the hard task) and made her give in to the urges (the easy task).

Instinctively, you know that your job is screwing your life (if you hate the job), but now you know exactly why. If I look back at my behavior when I was working at a regular job, the regular drinking and going out was succumbing to my urges as much as it was a deliberate fun activity.

So, if you don’t do anything productive after work and feel guilty about it, cut yourself some slack. It’s biology. Your ego is depleted and you need a change of work or a glass of fresh juice. No, really. Read on.

 

Mental energy is more than a metaphor

The nervous system consumes more glucose than most other parts of the body. So, the more strenuous your task is, the more glucose is consumed. Blood glucose level drops and the next task becomes more difficult to execute. 

In a demonstration of this concept, a group of volunteers was shown a short film featuring a woman. They were asked to interpret her body language. While they were at their task, a series of words crossed across the screen to distract them. And they were instructed to ignore the words, and refocus their attention on the woman if they found their attention drawn away. This self-control caused ego-depletion. After the end of the task, half of them were given glucose and the other half were not. Then, a second task followed where they needed to overcome their intuitive response to get the correct answer. The ones whose glucose level had increased performed much better than the others. The restoration of available level of sugar in the brain prevented the deterioration of performance.

A more disturbing demonstration of this phenomenon was in a study done on eight parole judges in Israel. Their job was to review applications for parole the whole day. It was found that the number of applications they approved was higher immediately after their food breaks. And, it dropped close to zero as the time since their last meal increased. The inference made from this data was that tired and hungry judges tend to fall back on the easier default position of denying requests for parole.

 

Glucose For The Win

It seems almost too trivial to even point out - drink a refreshing sugary drink after a challenging task. This isn’t news right? We all know it intuitively. But, knowing the science and how it affects the rest of our day helps. So, I have started keeping a reserve of lemonade with ample sugar in the fridge. When I feel tired, a glass of it restores my glucose level. Also, since I am convinced of the positive effect of glucose, a placebo kicks in and refreshes me even more.

Let me know if it works for you.

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Read Next: After-Office Productivity Hacks

The Why and How of a Daily Meditation Habit

Practicing meditation is a new habit that I want to develop and add into my daily schedule. I tried this earlier in a casual whenever-I-find-time kind of a way but it didn't work. Thus, I have decided to create a more formal plan this time. Hopefully, you can use these steps to create a new habit for yourself, whether it be meditation or something else.

 

THE WHY

The first critical step is to answer the question of why do you want to build the habit. At certain times in the habit forming process, you will have weak moments where you would want to give up for various reasons. Your answer to 'The Why' should help you persevere through the struggle against quitting. And the more objective this answer, the more undeniable the benefit of the habit becomes.

A few years ago, I would have scoffed at the idea of daily meditation. This was because I couldn't see a tangible causal relationship between meditation and improvement of life. At worst, I thought of it to be an elaborate scam. And, a placebo at best. This idea changed because of two Whys.

First: To improve my life by 10%. Where did this number come from? It is an arbitrary number which is the bottomline of the book 10% Happier. I don't claim that it is scientific by any measure, but I am willing to believe it to be true if it is backed by something less subjective such as my second why.

Second: All the positive results of the scientific studies conducted on the benefits of mediation. Some highlights of the findings via Headspace:

• According to Neuroscientists as you continue to meditate your brain physically changes, even though you’re not aware of it re-shaping itself.
• Research has found meditation to promote ‘divergent thinking’ a type of thinking that allows many new ideas to be generated.
• Neuroscientists have also found that, after just 11 hours of meditation, practitioners had structural changes in the part of the brain involved in monitoring our focus and self control.

Further Reading on Science behind Meditation: Buffer Blog, Forbes, Wikipedia

I got one such test done myself when I was at Auroville. My brain activity chart as compared to a regular meditator looked like a busy intersection of an urban city at office hours. It was messed up. 

Along with this, I read personal experiences of people and spoke to some friends who sing praises of the technique - technique, yes, that is what it is. Once I started thinking of it as a technique to sharpen the mind, along with the scientific studies to back the claim, my rational mind warmed up to the idea.

So, I thought of giving it a shot. And it felt pretty good. Not like out of the world good, but decent. Like my life became 10% better. If something which takes up only 10-15 minutes of my day (which is about 1% of the day) makes my life 10% better, I think it is a good deal to take. So, now that the intention is set, motivation is high, let's find the next step.

 

THE HOW

1. Trigger

If you read my post about creating an exercise and reading habit, you would know what I am talking about. A trigger is an activity which is already present in your daily schedule that is followed by your new habit. For example, my exercise is triggered by brushing my teeth. Or my morning reading is triggered by the end of my exercise. When the trigger goes off, I instinctively know what I have to do next since it is already planned. I save myself the struggle of trying to find ways to fit it into my schedule. 

Meditating at the start of the day makes my morning too rigid and leaves me with a late start to work. So, here's what I plan to do: I will meditate in the evening right after having a shower. It is a perfect time for me since that is when I usually take a break from work and go have a bath. The meditation right after shower will hopefully refresh me enough to take on the second half of my workday with more energy.

The Trigger = Taking a shower

2. Quantity

I'll start small. Not an hour a day, or 30 minutes or even 15. I am going to start with 10 minutes a day. I want to gradually increase it to 15, then 20 and top it off at 30 minutes. 10 minutes isn't actually that small for a start. If you were to do it, I would recommend starting with ridiculously smaller amounts like 1 or 2 minutes. But since I have been doing it infrequently over the last few months, I know that 10 minutes is good for me.

3. Accountability

While building a new habit, it helps to have an accountability partner. It is someone who you feel answerable to if you feel like taking a day off. Even though I am the kind of guy who likes to be self-reliant and likes to do things on his own, I realised the usefulness of this while trying to quit smoking. My girlfriend is my accountability partner there and she keeps reminding me certain things whenever I have the urge. By writing this post and sharing it with you all, you have become my accountability partners. We may not meet or speak frequently, but I would know that I have promised to do something and hopefully it will keep me on track. 

4. Tools

I plan to use an app called Insight Timer to keep time and track my progress. It is a nifty app which shows how many people are meditating at the same time as you. It's a nice touch and helps me stay on track.

There is another useful app for guided meditation called Headspace. Or you can use Coach.me for tracking other daily habits.

5. Technique and Study

From what I read so far, there seem to be multiple techniques of meditating. I am going to start simple by focusing on my breath. As I progress, I plan to learn new techniques and include them in my practice.

The study is optional for a meditation habit. But, I recommend it and it comes from my philosophy that learning about a trade deeply improves the experience. For example, if I enjoy a movie, I tend to go online and read about the stories behind its production and trivia associated with it. I spoke about it in an earlier post called How to Have More Fun at Fun.

 

END NOTES

Much like the rest of our body, the mind needs exercise as well. You could solve puzzles or do brain games & training. Meditation is another such thing to strengthen and train your mind. I would recommend giving it a try and then judge it based on your own experience. I did a meditation session yesterday and it was tough. 10 minutes seemed long. I felt both physically and mentally uncomfortable. But, I'll treat this as the initial pain when the brain muscle is jerked awake from its sleep and I'll persevere. 

Any regular practitioners out there? Would love to hear your experience so far.

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Read Next:  Mindfulness - An Introduction

Living One Perfect Day a Week

Last night, I lay awake in bed with a sickening feeling in my stomach that everything I am doing right now is going to fail. It made my head hurt and I couldn't sleep. I doubted my decisions and imagined all the worst case scenarios. 

Then morning came.

Like a bad habit, my first instinct was to look at my phone to check messages, social media, etc. For me, that's not the best way to start the day. I pondered upon the good habits I have developed (ref: Start With Art) and want to develop (Meditation). And during this reflection, I had an insight: 

What would my perfect day look like? And once that is figured out, can I live that day, today?

I don't need to do this everyday. But, just for today, I would live a perfect day of my life. The definition of perfect day for me is: Attaining maximum contentment within the practical constraints of the present situation.

So, I listed out all the things that would pass my test to become an ingredient in my perfect day. Here's my list of things I want to do:

• Wake up and not look at the phone (Failed)

• Exercise for 10 minutes (Success)

• Eat a fruit (Success - Watermelon)

• Read for 45 minutes (Success - Einstein: His Life and Universe)

• Write something original and publish it (If you are reading this, then Success)

• Meditate for 15 minutes

• Work

• Go out in the evening, get some air, run errands

• Work

• Learn something new - a language/skill/work related

• Find a nice new music album

• Chill with the friends and partner

• Have a beer or two while listening to that nice new album

• Indulge in dreamy conversation

Points to note: 

1. Failing to do a certain activity is OK. This is an aspirational list, not a mandatory one. (As you can see, I failed my first activity outright, but that's alright. The critical thing is to get back in the game.)

2. The perfect day doesn't mean doing the most things you can. Go back to the definition. If, at the moment of your life, the perfect day means sleeping in all day, then by all means. The key is to be deliberate about that decision.

3. A tip - Add an amount to your activity (15 minutes, 3 reps, etc.). You must have heard of TAG - Time and Amount goals and how they affect the chances of your accomplishing that goal. Well, this is pretty much what that is. 

4. The constraint of our daily life is our friend. Do whatever is possible within its scope. 

5. 'Once a week' is an out of the blue recommendation since it makes for a good title. Find your own frequency.

The reason I am doing this is to feel more in control of my life, even if for just one day. I don't yet know the full effect of this but I imagine that if we feel like shit and want a way to get things in order again, this might serve the purpose. I am about halfway done with my day. Let's see how the rest of it goes. So far, all good.

I hope you find it useful and I would love to hear your experiences with this technique. All the best! 

Cover Image via Unsplash

Start With Art

Over the past few weeks, I have formed two new habits to kick-start my day. One of them is Exercising. I had tried it before, but I was never disciplined. Two things have helped in changing that: 

• I have a designated trigger to exercise - brushing my teeth. Choosing a daily activity as a trigger to another one is a proven technique to form a new habit. As soon as I am done brushing, I know that the next thing I have to do is exercise. There is no struggle to find the time or the right mood, since the moment after brushing arrives every day.

Recommended reading on forming new habits: Leo Babauta's book Zen Habits.

• I ignore my mind - What I mean by this is that I get on the exercise mat on an autopilot mode. I don't let my mind rationalise and tell me to skip a day. There are days when it tells me that I am tired or taking a break just this one day wouldn't hurt. But, I have learnt to ignore it. It sounds simple, but is powerful. I have written about it earlier in the post The One skill to stick to your resolutions.

My exercise regime isn't too fancy by any measure. It resembles the popular 7-minute workout with a fair measure of stretching exercises on top. Additionally, I do a few stretches specifically for my upper back since I spend most of my waking hours on a chair.

But, this post is not about exercising. It is about what I do next - 

I read a book.

It doesn't seem like a big deal, but it has become one of the most important activities of my day. I call this start with art - Begin your day with reading a good book for whatever amount of time you can spare. I do it for about an hour and it has improved my life considerably. Allow me to explain how.

A good book fills me with inspiration and a desire to do something great myself. There have been many times when I read a page or two and the sheer beauty of the language spurred me on to write something of my own. I would then promptly close the book and sit down to write at a furious pace. New ideas would crash against the walls of my brain racing each other to be the first ones to appear on the blank page. 

Reading a nice book lifts you up and propels you into action. I recommend reading good literature in the morning. Life stories of great men and women isn't a bad choice either.

You could have chosen 'doing' versus 'consuming' art. If you can do that, go for it. But, my morning reading is like a cup of coffee which flicks on a light inside me. This 'consumption' makes the 'doing' easier.

The end of my exercise triggers the start with art. And my sheer love for reading has come in handy to form this habit. If you need suggestions, here's my reading list.

Give it a shot. You have everything to gain. And do tell if it works for you. Do you find yourself filled with more energy and endeavor to grab the day by its balls and carpe the fucking diem? I would love to hear if you have any other method to start the day that works for you.

Cover Image via Unsplash

Related Posts

1. The Catharsis of Creation
2. How to Cure Boredom
3. How to Live Life

10 Steps Guide to Mindful Online Reading

Have you seen Death Note? It is a brilliant Japanese Anime series that I am watching these days. One of the characters, L, has a habit of sitting on his haunches. This, he says, increases his deductive reasoning capacity by 40%. I don’t know how true this statement is but this was the position I was sitting in while reading an article on controlling our attention by Mark Manson. If you haven’t read his blog yet, you should. I had included it in my simplified reading list and I don’t ever regret doing so.

A combination of his thought provoking article, and the feeling of over-consumption that I've been struggling with lately, led me to a chain of thoughts which culminated into this post. While reading an article online we have a habit of jumping from one to another, sharing and commenting without even reading through the whole thing and in general, rushing on to finish it off the checklist. I figured, there has to be a better way instead. So, without further adieu, here is the 10 step ‘guide’ to mindful online reading. Perhaps, try out these techniques with this post and let me know if it was useful.

1. Keep your laptop away from you, preferably slightly more than one arm distance that you have to stretch a little bit to touch the keyboard. Our fingers have a habit of being finicky and they keep bouncing around clicking here and there and in general making a nuisance of themselves.
2. Finish reading what you have on the screen and once you’ve done that, move on to the next scroll. Don't keep scrolling after every few lines (unless you have a problem viewing what's written at the bottom of a page). The constant flickering of the screen causes a major distraction.
3. Keep your phone at a distance. 
4. Keep open a notebook/pen, an Evernote window or anything else you use to record your thoughts. You don't have to record anything though, no pressure.
5. While reading, feel free to take breaks - not to check a new message or notification but to think through what you’ve just read or simply just to take a deep breath.
6. Your mind will wander off every once in a while - to that conversation you had with someone in office, or that thing you have to do tomorrow. Gently bring it back to present. 
7. After finishing, take a few moments to think through the message and if it resonates with you or not.
8. Share your opinions and the article with a friend - not on Facebook or Twitter, although you can do that as well. But, share it in person, or over a phone call or in a private message. Have a thoughtful discussion around it.
9. DON’T jump on to the next article right away. Do something else, walk about a little bit aimlessly.
10. Respond to the author with your thoughts about it. Hearing from their readers is one of those things which writers cherish a lot. And some of the best connections start with a single email.

The purpose behind this step by step guide is to ensure that your really immerse yourself in what you are reading. I acknowledge that this borders on the line of being too painful to go through for everything your read online. But, every once in a while, for a really good article you find, try following some, if not all of these steps. 

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Simplifying everyday living

Our life is a sum total of the consequences of all the decisions that we make everyday. Every single day, we make countless big and small decisions which shape the course of our lives. What to wear, what to eat, whether to go out for dinner with that friend you haven't seen in a while or stay home and cook, so on and so forth. This constant decision making in every moment can take a toll on our mental space and leave us feeling exhausted. 

How do we cope with this? One way is to simplify our decision making. But, even after you do that, you still have to make those decisions. How about taking it one step forward and automating the decision making process? This, automated, simple and well-thought out decisions then become rules. 

Creating rules for your daily routine tasks frees up not only your day but clears up a lot of your mental space. These rules are based on your pre-thought out decisions. They are not made by any authority but by your own self which increases the chances of you actually going through with it. 

How do these rules look like? 
They can't be too generic - like Eat Healthier. This is not a rule. It is a state of life you want to reach to. Eat less sugar - this leaves ambiguity in the definition of what 'less' is. How about saying - Eat one sweet a week? This is actually a rule that I personally follow and so far I have been able to keep it up reasonably well. By making it time bound and by allowing a few treats I am also making it easier for me to follow since no sweet is much more difficult to do than one sweet a week.

There are multiple benefits with this. First is obviously that I eat less unhealthy stuff. Secondly, it is completely upto me to eat whatever I want as that one sweet of the week. I can choose to treat myself guilt free and without inhibitions.

Here are some of the rules that I intend to follow:

1. Creating restraints - Eat one dessert over the weekend, one in a weekday is OK; check social media two times a day for 15 minutes each; one hour of leisure internet in the evening. This gives me the time do indulge into those guilty pleasures while keeping a check on them taking over my life.

2. 30 seconds rule - After a work meeting, or after finishing up an article or after a movie, take 30 seconds to think through and if possible write down what happened and what you would like to remember about it. 

3. Zone out time - This is the voluntary zone out time to let your mind wander. While doing our everyday tasks, our mind has a habit of wandering off. When this happens, our tasks get delayed, work gets affected. Instead, what we can do is notice that this is happening, tell ourselves to keep this thought for the zone out time to think about later and gently bring the mind back to the task at hand.

4. Once a week clear up - Clear inbox over the weekend; clear Pocket queue; organise Evernote; clear out excess stuff from the house. This is to ensure a minimal style of living.

5. Eat that frog - This is a technique that I've actually been following for quite some time. Do the most difficult task first when your energy levels are higher. Keep the smaller stuff for later.

6. 15 seconds of mindfulness - Before starting a new activity, take a few moments to think if you actually want to do it or is it happening on its own accord. Be deliberate and take a few extra moments before rushing onto the next thing. 

These rules are intended to free up your mental space so that you can divert your time away from the mundane, unimportant or trivial to the more important stuff. Hope this technique serves you well.

For further reading on this topic, I recommend this Zenhabit's article.

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