Amidst a seemingly disruptive world with virtual connections, the chaos and distraction have conquered some of our young minds with indecision and overloaded information.
With our fingertips swiping and scrolling up and down on our devices, there is so much information. It could be from your friends, your colleagues, things that you constantly see that puts you into a dream of owning them, opinions of your Gurus, and the people you idealize.
You could feel that there’s so much more others are doing but you’re not. You feel you can strive for the better things that you think is right for you. But, ask yourself, “What is it right for me?”
We might think of creating a new habit every single day– a habit that transforms us into a better version of ourselves. We think of spending an hour in a day for meditation with a decision to wake up early in the morning, spending 45 minutes for a workout, develop healthy eating habits, reading a book, setting up goals for career, and a lot more.
There is a demand for an exemplary change in thought patterns and behaviour for better decision-making aiding in personal growth and development. There is one important aspect of life that will allow us to gain better control of ourselves before we lay our habits for personal growth and development. It is “Self-awareness.”
Self-awareness
We have the freedom to choose what we want. Our choices are motivated by a mix of two influences – internal and external.
Internal influences could be mood, emotions, desires, urges; external influences could be people, friends, lifestyle, environment, movies, music, etc.
The problem that we don’t notice most often is that the internal influences combine with external influences to form fantasies, fascinations, likes, dislikes, most of which the brain is choosing without much thought, almost impulsively. Are all our choices simply borrowed?
Borrowing knowledge and ideas to further improve ourselves is great. But there is a problem when the choices you make are based on the people’s approval ratings. Self-awareness cannot be taught. It is consciously questioning our actions with introspection, but at the same time not overthinking and pondering. You will gradually learn who you are at the core questioning yourself.
The Habit Debate
All the habits you feel you want to develop, it is time to decide whether they are worth it for you. How many times have you noticed yourself when you start off something new, it just spikes and drops off and forgotten about, and the habit does not stick.
Don’t get me wrong! For a lot of these habits, the outputs are pretty good. We all know the benefits of doing them. But when you analyse, all of these are zero sums’ game. If you do one habit, the time and mental energy have gone into that thing can be taken away from one other thing.
Yes! You can do them. There are so many of them following these habits as daily rituals. But, how much is it worth for you when the zero sums’ game is considered? Just because something is beneficial for you, does not mean it is worth doing because there may be other things that are even more beneficial for you. With all due respect, there is one daily habit that everybody should be doing. Yes! It is not the same for everybody.
Keeping The Main Thing The Main Thing
That one single habit is, “keeping the main thing the main thing.” If you are an artist, the daily habit you should be doing is necessarily not meditation or affirmations or workouts, but just picking up a paintbrush. Yes! You can do them when you want and they do have benefits, but it shouldn’t be confused and there shouldn’t be distortion in the distribution of your energy towards the main thing.
If you are a swimmer, the daily habit to be focused is getting in the pool. If you are a YouTuber, the daily habit is standing in front of the camera.
It is to ask yourself, “What do I want to achieve?”