Building a collection of habits
I have followed the writing of David Perell for a while and recently listened to some of the podcasts he has recorded. Somehow I stumbled on one with Daniel Gross. Towards the end of the podcast David mentions his aim to build the largest collection of habits he can.
He defined a habit as something you do and don’t have to think about and gave the example of going to the gym. If he experiments now to find what works for him and makes it a habit, as life becomes busy or changes he can continue it without having to think or make conscious decisions - it becomes easy/easier. So in his world it is a series of experiments to identify the key habits he can incorporate to improve his life with the minimal amount of conscious effort going forward.
This made me think about how I could introduce habits or any I already had.
I tend to be the first person up in the house each morning. I take the time before everyone else appears to catch up on a whole bunch of updates from websites, check the news headlines and most importantly read a section from the bible. For two and a half years I have been reading it every day, only about 10 minutes each time, and I aim to finish it each time at the end of the year. It is something I do every day as part of my routine, a habit.
Fitness would be a good one for me to identify as a habit - definitely an area for improvement. I have tried using an exercise bike and it worked for a while but then it became a chore. It helped that I left everything ready next to it so it was as easy as possible to use it however I didn’t really enjoy it. Currently I am doing a 20-30 minute walk before work - see my previous post - and it is great to get out but it is not really stretching me physically. I play walking football, which is much more strenuous than it sounds, however this is just once a week so has some, but minimal impact on my overall fitness. Maybe I will try the bike again but try and make it enjoyable in some way.
Have a think about what habits you could introduce to build a collection that will improve your life.
Links