Skip to main content

HOW TO REVIEW YOUR HABITS AND MAKE ADJUSTMENTS

 “Sustaining an effort is the most important thing for any enterprise.
The way to be successful is to learn how to do things right, then do them the same way every time.”

Reflection and review enables the long-term improvement of all habits because it makes you aware of your mistakes and helps you consider possible paths for improvement. Without reflection, we can make excuses, create rationalizations, and lie to ourselves. We have no process for determining whether we are performing better or worse compared to yesterday.

Top performers in all fields engage in various types of reflection and review, and the process doesn’t have to be complex. Kenyan runner Eliud Kipchoge is one of the greatest marathoners of all time and an Olympic gold medalist. He still takes notes after every practice in which he reviews his training for the day and searches for areas that can be improved. Similarly, gold medal swimmer Katie Ledecky records her wellness on a scale of 1 to 10 and includes notes on her nutrition and how well she slept. She also records the times posted by other swimmers. At the end of each week, her coach goes over her notes and adds his thoughts.

It’s not just athletes, either. When comedian Chris Rock is preparing fresh material, he will first appear at small nightclubs dozens of times and test hundreds of jokes. He brings a notepad on stage and records which bits go over well and where he needs to make adjustments. The few killer lines that survive will form the backbone of his new show.

I know of executives and investors who keep a “decision journal” in which they record the major decisions they make each week, why they made them, and what they expect the outcome to be. They review their choices at the end of each month or year to see where they were correct and where they went wrong.

Improvement is not just about learning habits, it’s also about fine tuning them. Reflection and review ensures that you spend your time on the right things and make course corrections whenever necessary. You don’t want to keep practicing a habit if it becomes ineffective.  

Reflection can also bring a sense of perspective. Daily habits are powerful because of how they compound, but worrying too much about every daily choice is like looking at yourself in the mirror from an inch away. You can see every imperfection and lose sight of the bigger picture. There is too much feedback. Conversely, never reviewing your habits is like never looking in the mirror. You aren’t aware of easily fixable flaws—a spot on your shirt, a bit of food in your teeth. There is too little feedback. Periodic reflection and review is like viewing yourself in the mirror from a conversational distance. You can see the important changes you should make without losing sight of the bigger picture. You want to view the entire mountain range, not obsess over each peak and valley.

Finally, reflection and review offers an ideal time to revisit one of the most important aspects of behavior change: identity.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

 Loss is painful, guilt can be devastating. Worse than losing one's dream is the knowledge that the loss was self-inflicted. Problems are solutions that have outlived their usefulness. Problems are pattern that were learned in emotional circumstances during one period of life and that now have taken an existence of their own. Many times, outdated solutions replay themselves in a variety of life situations, leaving people mindlessly repeating their mistakes in work, love, and trading. There can be no free will for people who are locked into patterns developed for past challenges. Successful traders are therapists both learn to do what comes unnaturally. The resolution to problems can be found in what people are doing when those problems are not occurring. The problem with many traders is not that they have problems, but that they are focused on their problems. It is this problem focus that prevents them from appreciating what they are doing right, that blinds them to solutions alrea...
Post a Comment
Read more

Three Choices

When we are unhappy and our Life Conditions do not match our Blueprint, we have three choices as to how we’re going to handle the challenge: First Choice: Blame The first choice people have is to assign blame, and there are three things you can blame: a) Event . There’s a story, something that happened, behind why things are the way they are. However accurate the story may be, blaming an event is convenient because it helps preserve an identity designed to shield us from our true fears: fear of failure and fear of not being loved or accepted. b) Others . “I’m in this situation because this person …” Similarly, the story may be true, but it’s convenient and gives you comfort in the moment. “There’s nothing wrong with me. It’s this other person. There’s nothing I need to change.”  c) Yourself . Most people think that this is being responsible, but blaming yourself will not make it better. There’s a difference between responsibility and beating yourself up—between “Here’s a pattern th...
Post a Comment
Read more

Wealth File #15 Rich people have their money work hard for them. Poor people work hard for their money

Working hard is important, but working hard alone will never make you rich. Rich people can spend their days playing and relaxing because they work smart. They understand and use leverage. They employ other people to work for them and their money to work for them. You do have to work hard for money. For rich people, however, this is a temporary situation. For poor people, it's permanent.. Rich people understand that "you" have to work hard until your "money" works hard enough to take your place they understand  the more your money works, the less you will have to work. To win the money game, the goal is to earn enough passive income to pay for your desired lifestyle. In short, you become financially free when your passive income exceeds your expenses. Rich people think long-term. They balance their spending on enjoyment today with investing for freedom tomorrow. Poor people think short-term. They run their lives based on immediate gratifications. To in...
Post a Comment
Read more