Reinventing Yourself using Mini Habits
Are we nearing the end of COVID-time? Things are still uncertain. As spring flowers bloom and the weather warms up, more and more people are getting vaccinated. As more restaurants and shops open in your area, it seems like there is some hope, some relief from COVID weariness—light at the end of the tunnel and an opportunity to reinvent ourselves.
The poet Ralph Waldo Emerson once said:
“Insist on yourself, never imitate.”
I have this quote stuck to my shower door where I see it every morning. It inspires me every day to see life—and in particular life over the next few months—as an opportunity to renew, rediscover and reinvent. There has been a different kind of stuck for many of us over the last year also; a belief that we are somehow powerless to positively influence our own lives.
However, it is within our power to cast off old habits that no longer serve and choose our renewed path forward. I like the idea that President Biden suggested in his first speech to the nation: the idea of getting my barbecue ready for a backyard July 4th picnic with a small group of friends. I’m hoping that at some point, I won’t have to wear a mask and can hug more people.
More and more people are flying again in the US; I experienced the crowds at the Denver Airport recently as I visited my daughters on the East Coast for the first time since the Pandemic. It was the same zoo as traveling during regular spring break only everyone wore masks.
I’ve been curious about what renewal and reinvention could look like in the coming months. I’m thinking of this Process of Renewal as a kind of open space, a psychological DMZ if you will, or more whimsically, “wiggle room.” On a global scale, there could be a new freedom in which to re-design, reinterpret and reinvent who we are and who we want to be.
And as I write this, I am aware that freedoms are not equal opportunity. Some people will be coming out of COVID totally decimated financially and emotionally and will have to rise from the ashes. For others, it will be more like a bear coming out of hibernation, feeling still a big groggy and foggy, seeking whatever low-hanging fruit is available. For most of us it will be a slow process and there is no guarantee it will be smooth.
I had an interesting email exchange with a clinical psychologist named Dr. Zachary Green, who is a Professor of Practice and Director of Leadership Development at the University of San Diego. I’d seen a webinar he gave on Mapping the Stages of Development in Contagion Response last year. He wrote more recently:
My thinking has shifted in one significant way since the paper was first written. What my co-author David McCallum and I did not consider fully is the impact of the collective trauma. We believe that the return of violence in the form of mass shootings and xenophobic attacks on Asian citizens is a response to the repressed rage about being "locked up" for a year. It is evident that some are not able to hold what it has meant to have liberty so restricted and are, thereby, seeking repositories for that rage. While the very public events of the last week speak to extremes of this circumstance, we believe that they are symptoms of an underlying pain that has not yet even begun to come to surface. It will become more pronounced when people encounter the variable ways in which people seek AND DO NOT seek to engage with each other personally and professionally in coming months--and years.
It is hard to predict what people will and will not do. How will we engage and have compassion (or not) for one another? It’s hard to know how to reflect upon a year of lockdown with so many shifts and changes. And if there is reflection that occurs, how will people choose to change and grow?
Reframing is one of the basic concepts of coaching. It is a tool you can use to change your perspective and give yourself more options and possibilities moving forward. The only person I can change is myself. Ugh, this is a hard and bitter truth but hopeful and empowering as well!
So how do I change my relationship with the thing (whatever thing it is currently that is bothering or challenging me)? The thing/issue/problem could be anything:
creating better work/life balance
getting a new job
shedding excess body weight
readjusting to loss
repairing relationships
moving to a new location
making travel plans
Although I don’t like to use the words always and never because it makes for black and white thinking, I think in this case it is warranted:
It’s never really about “the thing” and always about our relationship to the thing.
Looking at weight is the example. I’ve lost the same 20 pounds three times now. Once with a program for Healthy Hearts I did with my father over a decade ago to encourage him; once through counting calories/points with Weight-Watchers; and most recently by following a Keto lifestyle plan while coaching patients who were doing the same to boost their cognitive functioning. Unfortunately, like 85% of people who make dietary changes, when I stopped following these regimens, I gained back the weight.
Having just turned 61 (the age my mother died of breast cancer) the key in my mind is sustainability and quality of life. Ideally, I’d like to live for another 20 years. Eighty one sounds good—hell, maybe even 88!
But how do people renew and refresh their ongoing efforts to be a 2.0 version of themselves? How can you stay motivated so you can continue on and progress, even if it is little by little? How can you stay current with yourself as to what changes you are committed to as you hold the Vision of Your Life? This is the stuff of renewal and change. The acknowledgement and celebration of progress, and the feeling of accomplishment, can keep you going—and a sense of evolution, too, if you want to get more esoteric.
A decade ago I wrote a blog called “Accepting the Belly.” I realized that acceptance has a lot to do with growth and reframing. When I was doing Keto, for instance, I relied a lot on my willpower, which is, unfortunately a finite resource, as discovered by Professor Roy Baumeister, who wrote a book called Willpower. Baumeister says:
Your supply of willpower is limited, and you use the same resource for many different things. Each day may start off with your stock of willpower fresh and renewed, at least if you’ve had a good night’s sleep and a healthy breakfast. But then all day things chip and nibble away at it. The complexity of modern life makes it difficult to keep in mind that all these seemingly unrelated chores and demands draw on the same account inside of you. (p. 243)
There are many ways to continue problem solving, however, and most of them require learning. If we want renewal and to refresh our current view of who we are and who we are meant to be, it takes reflection, creativity and then committing to, and practicing, new habits.
I have found using mini habits, a very useful way to create change in my life. Mini habits are new habits that you want to do consistently so that they become a part of your daily life. They can also serve as “place-holders” or “bookmarks” for a habit that you may want to try on for now and grow or expand later.
On his website, minihabits.com, Stephen Guise defines mini habits as:
a very small positive behavior that you force yourself to do every day; its “too small to fail” nature makes it weightless, deceptively powerful, and a superior habit-building strategy. You will have no choice but to believe in yourself when you’re always moving forward. The barrier to the first step is so low that even depressed or “stuck” people can find early success and begin to reverse their lives right away.
The maximum number of mini habits that Guise advises to take on is between one and four. They can’t take more than 5-minutes each and can take as little as one minute each. And lastly, there should be some form of tracking that you use, whether that be a calendar, a string of beads (adding one bead every time you do your habit), or an app like Strides or Streaks. The mini habits I have done over the past 66 days are these:
1. Drinking water each morning before I drink coffee. This is so I can rehydrate (because sleeping is a dehydrating activity) and also so I can lengthen my fast between my last meal of the day and breakfast. I used to have a cup of hot water before having coffee. Now I am tending to drink a large glass of water as I go through my morning routine of feeding the cats and . . . (see below).
2. Unloading the dishwasher. This is for my relationship and to support the balance between chores done by my husband and me. Added bonus: I no longer have to listen to my husband complain about doing more than his share of chores; instead he appreciates my consistency.
3. Eat a piece of fruit a day. This is actually so I will eat less chocolate in the form of dessert. I got into that habit (with 87% cacao bars) during Keto. Fruit is pretty much a no-no on Keto because of its naturally occurring sugars. I never ate fresh fruit as a kid, so this is a welcome and adventurous new habit for me.
4. Five-minutes a day of Yoga with Adriene on Youtube. I’m surprised at how much my flexibility has improved with a consistent routine of five minutes of stretching! Who knew? And sometimes I go for ten minutes and it doesn’t feel like I’m fighting myself at all.
Minihabits are a way to ease into consistency and having a new identity. I now actually think of myself as “Someone Who Does Yoga” even though I can’t manage about 80% of what Adriene is encouraging me to do. Still, I feel like I am more familiar with the vast pool of Yoga by simply going to the water and dipping my toe in each day! And there is no one on the planet more encouraging (except maybe yours truly) than Adriene. And all of her classes are free!
As you think of how you want to reframe your life and/or consider what renewal looks like for you, I hope you will find a way to do it in a way that is uniquely yours. Being on the path to renewal is a supportive way to live, appreciating the actions we take to be the 2.0 version of ourselves without falling into the trap of improving ourselves out of the fear that we are not good enough.
Rest assured, you are good enough exactly as you are. Keep going and feel free to jump in whereever you are, the water is fine.
Your contribution matters.
