My car kept bumping into this mid-street shallow hole on the way to work, making a loud startling noise while driving. Actually, my car wasn’t. I was. I was bumping into this hole which informed me I was too mindless to notice the street environment. It was a good “Get Present” reminder.
Now I feel like a mindfulness superhero whenever I dodge that hole.
You broke your diet?
You binged on social media and Netflix?
You yelled at your kids again despite your intentions to be a calmer parent?
You stopped meditating?
You stopped working out?
You gossiped again?
You stayed up way too late?
You slept in way too late?
You let your books collect dust?
You broke the chain of your new daily habit?
You checked your phone first thing in the morning?
You did not do what you said you would?
You let the gas tank go empty?
You went to bed with makeup on?
You did not return that phone call?
You kept picking up your phone while with family?
You kept picking up your phone in your focused session?
You got the gift last minute?
You forgot to drink water?
You postponed that task one more time?
Good! Now you are aware this is not what you want.
Forgive yourself and simply recommit.
That is the beauty of a new day.
I started my Saturday at 7am by taking a one-hour walk with 2 dear friends of mine. It felt so good to start my day on such a high note that I will try to commit to it every Saturday, especially with this great weather.
Walking has been a consistent habit of mine since last year’s lock-down. I have been mostly doing it in the evenings to watch the breathtaking sunset view we have outside our house. Today however, I felt rewarded socially by seeing my friends, which we don’t get to do during these tough times, and also by seeing many people walking this early on their day off. I consider walking as a new habit in our culture and I’m proud it is spreading.
Do you walk? Our physiology changes when we move, so get going.
I recommend getting a smart watch to track your steps, it’ll make it a game you can win every day.
In her book, Girl Stop Apologizing, Rachel Hollis shares the details of the help she gets to be able run her successful business, such as her nanny, personal trainer, parents and so on. She encourages women to share those details too to motivate others to pursue their own goals. Because, if we pretend we’re doing it all alone then we’re not sharing the whole story. Especially women, yes we can raise a family, have a 9-5 job and achieve our personal ambitions, but with help. Anything else is a recipe for burnout.
I want to acknowledge that I get a lot of help, my parents’ helper comes and cleans my house every week, my amazing in-laws take care of my kids and their online schooling and meals while I’m at work, my parents watch my kids while I run errands, my husband takes the kids out so I can record my podcast and puts them to bed while I’m shooting videos among many other forms of support. I’m blessed to have them by my side. This is only my immediate family and I still have a long list to thank, like friends who provide huge emotional support to me in my ups and downs. You get the idea. It takes a village and I don’t take it for granted.
What about you? Who is helping you now? Who could be helping you to have more time and space? Could you and a friend do that for each other? Figuring this out is so important and the sooner you do the better.
Some of us took this year harder than others and some lost so much. Let’s see them and let them know they don’t have to be alone. Let’s notice those people. Let’s offer whatever help we can.
If you are one of those people, you are not alone.
Please do ask for help. Don’t pretend to be fine when you are not. Asking for help is not weakness. It’s the responsible thing to do for you and for the sake of everyone who cares about you.
Let’s help and ask for help.
In this 2-part podcast interview of the super smart both Ph.D. authors Susan David and Brené Brown, I learned exactly how toxic positivity manifests in our lives when Dr. Susan did this exercise with her host Dr. Brené (excerpted from the transcript):
SD: If I invite you to think about the last couple of months, and I invite you on a blank piece of paper to write an emotion you’ve experienced or that’s been tough on you, what would you put?
BB: Okay. Overwhelmed, scared, fearful, weary, confused.
SD: So, if you write these emotions on a piece of paper in a world that tells you to just be positive, they would say, “Turn the piece of paper over now and write why you’re grateful. Okay, write why you’re happy. Write why you’ve got so much more than other people.” And what that is doing is false forced positivity, and it undermines your resilience, and it undermines your emotional agility.
Mind. Blown.
I encourage you to listen to both parts of the episode and enjoy this wonderful emotional intelligence course like I did. We need to hear all of this now more than ever for our mental health and wellbeing and to help those around us.
As for me, I will go read Susan’s book “Emotional Agility” one more time. Highly recommended.
Are you really? I still need to practice some self-constraint when hearing adults complaining to me of being bored.
With all the resources of learning, connection and entertainment we have, maybe you need to dig a little deeper, and I can safely assume you have access to those resources if you are reading this, unlike many other people in this world who still don’t.
So let’s dig deeper: Could you be jumping to labeling your emotion way too fast? Could it be loneliness? Could the feeling be missing face-to- face in-person non-screen connection in the pandemic? Could it be nostalgia? Could it be doing something you don’t love at work or home? Could it be tiredness, sleepiness or low energy?
What you need to hear about this word is the hint of victimhood it conveys. Please save me! is the subtitle. Let me ask you this: Do you need to be saved? Who is the hero you are waiting for? Why are you giving up responsibility of your feelings and mood like that?
Continue reading “Bored?”Note: Michael Hyatt uses the term preview not review on purpose because in this practice we are not just reviewing the past, we are also preparing for a better week ahead based on the insights we gain. So without further ado here it is:
The Weekly Preview Practice according to Full Focus Planner by Michael Hyatt.
I was reading the Arabic translation of an English book that I owned to be able to find better words to use for my Arabic podcast. The translation was excellent and kept the spirit of this favorite book of mine intact. Then I noticed a mistake in translation where the translator missed negating a sentence that the author did. The first thought that came into mind was: oh I have to find the email address of the translator and notify him to make sure he fixes this in the next version! Then, I noticed my thoughts.
Continue reading “Find The Good”I’ve talked often in this blog about the power of chains as a way to track habits, simply because It works. Crossing off any habit as “done” is the exact kind of short term reward that enforces commitment to an action until it becomes a habit. Seeing the chain of daily wins growing is powerful to keep at it.
James Clear mentioned the example of his father who swims daily, and to keep himself motivated , crosses off the day on his calendar after. Why? because on a day-to-day basis he can’t see the impact of committing to his habit, however, every time he crosses off that calendar he feels progress towards becoming healthier.
This is a key idea in James’s book Atomic Habits; every time we commit to a habit we cast a vote to the identity of the type of person we want to become. We need to ask ourselves 2 questions to form the right habits for us:
For example, if healthy is our new chosen identity, we need to ask ourselves what would a healthy person do? What meal would he/she pick? What would they say when offered dessert? Every time we work out we also strengthen our new identity as healthy people, our chain would prove it even if we still can’t or feel the results yet. Seeing visual progress helps us keep going instead of quitting.
I enjoy how some applications and platforms also use the concept of chains, Readwise keeps a streak of how many days users read their selection of book highlights. Akmibo workshops keep streaks of how many days students show up in the workshop in a row and notify them every now and then and also post their names on a board for all streak keepers. As their student, this makes me want to show up even more to keep and grow my streak, this is the funny and lovely thing about our beautiful human brain, it gets so motivated by all this tracking and rewarding.
Make the magic of streaks work for you too. Start a chain of a new daily habit and keep showing up every single day. Remember to ask what kind of person you want to be, then do what that person does and track it everyday.