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“You will never change your life until you change something You do daily. The secret of your success is found in your daily routines” ~ John C. Maxwell.
In the previous chapter you learned about how certain specific types of mindsets are so much important to be cultivated in our heads to design our days.
While, you have to continuously work on maintaining and upgrading your mindset (just like you take a bath every day), installing certain everyday routines would surely do wonders to put your growth journey on auto-pilot mode.
The pre-requisite is that these routines need to be followed like rituals.
Why do I insist these to be followed like rituals?
Because rituals are something, which our minds follow with a much deeper faith and without raising any doubts or question around those.
The dictionary defines “ritual” as a series of actions or type of behaviour regularly and invariably followed by someone.
Most of you would remember since your childhood days, how your elders have followed certain steps in a particular sequence during your worship.
Most of you have never bothered to question, why a particular activity and sequence is followed.
Similarly, if you instill certain activities in your daily life as rituals and follow them sincerely, then these will have a compound effect over a period of time.
The idea is not to blindly follow certain activities; rather you should first understand why you should fit any particular activity in your already busy schedule.
In this chapter, basis my experience I have listed certain activities and stated the rationale for making them necessary ingredients for your “wonderful day recipe”.
The understated actions appear to me to be amongst the most important rituals (already being followed by the successful people all around the world), which if followed sincerely will prove to be the stepping stone to jumpstart your growth journey.
Let’s list out these:
Ritual 1:
Gratitude: the first thing after you get out of your bed.
"Be thankful for what you have; you'll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don't have, you will never, ever have enough." Oprah Winfrey
Gratitude is simply a feeling or emotion of being thankful for being endowed with certain blessings in our lives.
This is not something, which is required to be forced upon us or we should feel this under some pressure. Gratitude is our expression of thankfulness to the universe for giving us whatever we posses.
Though, you and I may be complaining about a lot of things, which we lack in our lives. But even still there are plenty of reasons for feeling blessed in this very moment.
Let’s look at a simple fact. If you are reading this book in digital version, means you have access to the internet and electricity in your location and a gadget to read this.
But, if you see around more than half of the world population sleeps empty stomach, without any access to clean drinking water, forget about any basic amenities. In that scenario, merely on this count we should be expressing the gratitude towards the blessings we are possessed with.
Please don’t get me wrong here. I am not in any manner discouraging you for your high ambitions in life. The simple idea is that while your eyes must always be to grab the stars, but you should also appreciate that you are already much ahead in the journey towards stars (with so many people lacking so much). So you focus should be on growth, while appreciating what you have already achieved.
I don’t know about you, but am sure that there must be plenty of things, which you have and can very well acknowledge and be thankful for. For example:
Now, the question comes that how does it help me to design my day?
Here is the answer:
There are enough studies and the neuroscience has time and again proved that we get more of the things, which we focus on.
Robert A. Emmons, PhD, professor of psychology at University of California, Davis, pioneer in the research on gratitude is the author of Thanks: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier. He states that what makes gratitude the “magic ingredient” is that it takes us outside ourselves so that we can see how we are part of the larger, intricate network of sustaining relationships — relationships that are reciprocal.
So if we are thankful for what we have already, then those things will grow. Further, if we focus only on lack of things or negativity, we will intensify the feeling of scarcity.
It just will take a couple of minutes for conveying thanks to the universe for all the blessings you have already.
Ritual 2:
Practicing Silence (another form of meditation):
The best time to practice silence is first thing in the morning.
When you wake up in the morning, you are in the most relaxed state of mind. If you add silence to this relax state that will be an icing on the cake and will tremendously enhance your creativity and productivity.
Reason being as soon as you wake up, the thoughts of the day in front of us start snatching all our attention immediately. There are high changes that you will pick up your smart phone the very first thing and then get lost in the mires of emails from office/business demanding your immediate attention.
We realize the significance of the day to day affairs, as at the end of the day these only enable us to pay our bills, so you have to be considerate and careful about them. But the important thing to remember is that you are anyway going to address those work demands in the next couple of hours (unless there is something, which just can’t wait for couple of hours even, and yes, there are some one-off urgent occasions like this), so why not strengthen your mind muscle to handle those things in a very efficient manner.
Practicing silence is like putting engine oil in the mind machine, which will reduce any friction and help the mind to run more smoothly and efficiently for the rest of the day.
Silence settles the so called ‘dust of thoughts’ hovering around in our minds.
Our mind is like a fluid vibrating in a container. If you sit silently, it allows all the thoughts to settle down sooner than later with practice. Once the thoughts are settled, then the mind gets connected with the universe and with some consistent practice, you may start receiving the signal from the universe to get more and more clarity in your thinking process.
This will improve your ability to make distinction between the various alternatives available in front of you at any particular point of time. Also, you would be more resourceful, as there would not be any mountains of thought clouded in your head.
Though, you can sit anywhere anytime and keep practice silence, there are some techniques, which give instructions to your body to get relaxed much quicker and once practiced, can relax your mind at any point of time in your day for better results.
Some of you may not be naturally inclined to sit silently even for a lesser time. For them there are plenty of apps to help you out with guided meditation and enhancing silence. I have personally used an app called “Headspace” (https://www.headspace.com) and found this very useful guided meditation to bring silence.
Ritual No. 3= Exercise:
“A healthy mind resides in a healthy body”
I understand that our life schedules are so hectic and finding time for doing some exercise is really a challenge.
Also, we do think that we are already so tired and doing some more exercise on the top of it will make us more tired.
But the science has already proven time and again that exercise, even if for lesser time, but done on consistent basis has very positive impact on your brain. It regenerates the brain cells by supplying more oxygen, which develops the cognitive process and help us to think clearly.
You must have noticed that when you are doing exercises or come home after a short run outside, the mind floods tons of ideas. If you have not experienced this, try it next time with a note pad or an audio recording app in your phone and count the number of resourceful ideas (related to your work or family or anything, which you are currently engaged in) your mind generates after a brief round of exercise.
Tony Robbins says that doing regular exercises improves your level of courage i.e. your power to stand in front of your fears. With higher level of courage, you dare to take more action during your day.
When you exercise, your body releases chemicals called endorphins. These endorphins interact with the receptors in your brain that reduce your perception of pain and also trigger a positive feeling in the body. It helps in better concentration and decision making, which will ensure that we achieve better results in lesser time.
Remember: “Doing something is always better than nothing”
So even if you feel that you are short of time, still spending 15 to 30 minutes a day on moving your body in any manner is the best gift you can give to your body and mind
Moreover, shortage of time is generally a self-made perception and it is generally a matter of prioritization of activities (and exercise might have been placed one number below your last item). And such perceptions break in matter of seconds sometimes. Imagine, your doctor tells you that you are very close to getting a cardiac arrest/heart failure and may die, suddenly your prioritization list will have exercise on the top of chart, as it is now a question of life.
So don’t make any excuse of shortage of time or being not aware of the relevant exercise, in this ‘Mr. Google Age’, when you can get any information on anything you want. So put your sports gear on and get out of your comfy home starting today itself
Ritual No. 4: Growth Reading (also includes listening or watching too):
“Today a reader, tomorrow a leader” ~ Margaret Fuller
Reading broadens your perspective of the world and you are able to see through the things with a much wider perspective.
If you are a knowledge worker i.e. professional in any field i.e. engineer, lawyer, architect, accountant, doctor or any professional, it goes without saying that you have to enhance your skills on an ongoing basis to remain valuable to your organization or your clients.
So chances are that you get time to read or have to read something related to your professional field during your working hours. Else you may have friends or conferences, from whom you keep your professional skills updated.
However, here I am talking about different kind of reading. This reading is about working on improving your psychology, which is primarily responsible for improving philosophical or psychological acumen of your mind.
“80% of Success is psychology and 20 % is mechanics – Tony Robbins”
Remember only technical skills won’t lead you to the apex of your career; rather you would require a growth oriented psychological state of mind to overcome different kind of challenges in your life.
In the previous chapter, you already have heard about the reading habits of highly successful people.
You need to work on your leadership, better understanding of people and managing their expectations, how to keep yourself inspired and get others motivated to achieve the higher results in the life. The books are one of the best tools to equip you with all these traits. Reading a good book equals to getting into the head of the author and grabbing all the wisdom nuggets, learnt by the author in his lifetime, but put in a very structured way for your quick consumption and understanding.
Growth reading is spending not much, but at least 15 minutes in a day for sharpening your psychology to help you play your game better.
I have personally seen the phases in my personal and professional life, where I was reading on these aspects and was able to perform differently and more positively. However, I also had times, when I didn’t spend time developing my inner state of affairs and faced the harder knocks from life (though learnt great lessons over this bumpy ride.)
For recommended reading to enhance your productivity, please go through one of my blog article on the link below. I have read and personally found these books very useful and full of actionable stuff. Click below Link.
10 Best-seller Books which every aspiring Productivity Hacker Must READ!
Ritual no. 5- Journaling:
Oh come on! You might be thinking now, where the hell in this world are you going to find time to do all these activities with already 78 items in your to-do list?
It may sound counter-intuitive to you. But absolutely for the very same reasons, I recommend journaling.
Journaling is simply releasing all the thoughts out of your mind and putting on the paper (or your computer), which clears your mind. As David Allen in his best-selling book “Getting Things Done” stated to create an external mind, by dumping all your thoughts wondering in your head on a piece of paper (or on your digital device). David goes on to state the principal that “You don’t need more time, you need a clear head”. So journaling is the life saver here.
Unfortunately our minds do not quickly differentiate between very important thoughts and thoughts about the trivial issues. Also the capacity of mind is to process 4-5 thoughts at one point of time as the cognitive studies has indicated and irony is that we keep our minds loaded with hundreds of thoughts.
With journaling, you do a favour to your mind to get relaxed as everything it was forced to remember to do, is now put on piece of paper. Now with the empty and clearer mind, you are able to have fresh perspective and get more resourceful thoughts.. The clear mind now will help you to:
- Prioritize your already pending action items on 80:20 principle (as explained earlier in previous chapter)
- The intuitive signals from the universe slowly start getting louder and you become more resourceful and receive the quicker solutions to handle your never-ending existing pending list quickly.
What is the best way to do or what all to capture in the daily Journal:
One of the ingredients as stated above is a form of journaling, but it is more of “mind sweeping”. However, it is recommended to capture your thoughts on some specific areas of your life in the journal.
I personally capture following areas in my daily journal, which you may also follow to start with and add more, depending upon your life circumstances:
Another significant benefit of journaling is that it helps reduce unnecessary fear and anxiety from your head and makes you more action oriented.
However the real taste is in the pudding, so try this and see the difference.
Ritual no. 6:- Visualization:
Everything in this universe is energy, some in open form like air, sky etc. and some in very condensed form, like our body. And the universe works on the vibration of energy.
If your energy attracting chords are very clear and not shadowed by your own logical brain clouded with un-resourceful thoughts, this has great power to attract the right kind of people, resources and circumstances in front of you (which you would have never imagined ever).
Do you remember that sometimes you feel like calling someone over phone and suddenly the same person calls you or appear in front of you. And you wonder, how did this happen?
Also, as you know all mothers are so attached to their kids that they sometimes intuitively come to know that their kids are in the need of something, even if the kids are far away from the mothers.
There are plenty of other examples, which you can hear in this world, which proves that things happen due to vibrations in the universe. This is the power of these vibrations.
So why not use this power of vibration to our benefits?
Why not create such vibrations, which can lead to the ultimate benefit for your lives?
So the call to action for you is to visualize your ideal life by closing your eyes every day for 5-10 minutes. Whatever you have dreamt about in your life, visualize that you have already achieved your goal and then the most important part, you need to use all the five senses in that state of visualization.
Let’s take an example.
Assuming your ideal visualization is a very serene mountain area and you are staying in a nice and comfy cottage over there over a long vacation (if this is your dream). Now use your all five senses in a way that
- Your eyes are watching the scene of white mountains with snows and touching the blue sky;
- Your face can feel the touch of the cool breeze around;
- Your nostrils are filled with the fresh air, which is out of this world.
- You are listening to the sounds of the cool breeze passing close to your ears and make your ear shiver.
- You are enjoying drinking your favour chocoloate drink or mocha and are feeling the flavor of that drink in your mouth.
In those 5-10 minutes, you should be in your ideal world, which you could imagine to the best of your senses.
So, some of you might say, it is day dreaming. Some of you might think it is running away from the hard realities of life.
But no! Please understand that you only create your own world. Everything, ever created in this world was first created in the mind.
The only difference for creation in the internal world and the outside world is the difference of time and space.
In the internal world, you can see the massive outcome in the moment of your visualization. But the outside world has the limitation of the time and space to achieve the desired objectives.
Let me explain. The outside world is made of matter and substance. So it takes time and it has to emerge in the form of substance, provided you are consistent in your approach.
But, then some of you might be saying that I have tried this a few times, but nothing has changed. So, the key cause for that is the lack of consistency in sending the message to the universe
May be you have started doubting yourself. May be you started thinking negative thoughts in your mind while visualization or have a feeling that all this is a woo-woo self-help kind of thing etc.
The key principle in the mental world to achieve success is that you have to fill your mind with ultimate sense of certainty of outcome. If you keep giving two almost different messages, it won’t ever act to your benefit. And you will continue to remain as it is without any change.
Remaining in the known bad state of affairs, still gives a comfort to human being, instead of unknown state of things (which has the possibility of catapulting your future to your best). All of us think that a known devil is better than an unknown angel. So that is the reason that most of the people often fail to change and end up remaining the same in their entire lives.
Consistent visualization about your dream life has the power to create a stronger belief about the certainty of the outcome.
By starting your day with visualization, your mind pops up the actionable ideas to bring your imagination to the realities. It has the high potential to bring you closer to your dream.
So, I have written a lot about visualization as of now, but again, proof is in the pudding. Follow this for couple of weeks consistently and you can feel the difference.
If you want to get a free master-class on creative visualization, which I had done in past, please visit www.creativevisualization.com , which is the high quality material from www.mindvalley.com
