Feeling good

tldr;

  • I want to feel good about myself and my actions
    • I can remove the stupid habits and take good actions or I can change my perspective on the actions I take
  • If I am not careful tracking habits becomes the goal not improving and being better
    • This leads to downward spirals when “the day is already lost”
  • If you truly understand what you are trying to do you see streaks and habits as byproducts and treat them as such
  • Creating a distinction between you and the bad habits may help you stop spirals caused by coping mechanisms
  • You should change your perspective so that you can get back on track quickly but you should try and stay on track

I am not trying to do the most work, lift the heaviest weights, score the most points, at the end of the day I just want to feel good about myself and the actions I take.

Despite reading and re-reading books on breaking and making habits, accomplishing goals and being disciplined I have been stuck with the thought “what if I could just do what I said I would do” for years. The knowledge about what I should do is not the issue. I can identify some clear points for improvement I just haven’t been able to implement long term solutions. We are well past the point where extra knowledge will help, instead different actions and perspectives are required.

I can identify two clear solutions to the problem how to feel good about your self and your own actions. One, do the difficult things see yourself ticking the boxes and achieving goals. Two, change your perspective on your actions so you feel better about them. Perhaps you can implement and stick with the first option and don’t need the second but I am discovering a balance is required.

I love the part of me that is pushing me to be go further do more and not be content with where I am. But I have to acknowledge that attempting to follow it has not lead me to feel good about myself consistently yet. There are no inherent issues with this drive but there is an issue with the systems which I use to track and keep myself accountable (which I then focus on). Generally I have implemented binary tracking systems for habits, which leads to especially poor results for the bad habits I am tracking once they are broken (e.g. don’t watch shit content). My brain argues that there is no point getting back on track because the habit is already broken. From the perspective of the black and white tracking system this is correct, but in terms of actually improving and breaking habits this is even more stupid than the habits themselves. Apart from the techinical issues of the tracking system this points to a bigger issue of misalignment with the actions I take and why I do them.

This all reminds me of a quote from Naval “understanding is more important than discipline”. If I truly focus on understanding, than I should know that the important thing is getting back on track, not the breaking of the streak. The streak is not the goal of what I am doing it is merely a byproduct of the work and should be treated as such. Personally as someone who really likes numbers and tracking systems this is a difficult perspective shift as it moves into the world of subjectivity. But the tracked habits are not the goal they are merely a lagging indicator of some specific actions and the broader picture of the day can never be captured in it so I shouldn’t evaluate myself soley by it.

An intersting approach that I heard from Bryan Johnson is to label versions of yourself that do certain actions. He gives the example of “Evening Bryan” who is not allowed to eat junk food, an issue that he once had. I really like this idea because it creates a division between the bad actions and the self, making it a lot easier for me to not hate myself for the bad actions. This self loathing for my own behaviour only serves to bring me down further, causing me to turn to bad habits as coping methods. If you instead say “Lazy Liam” did this it removes the requirement to turn to coping mechanisms because you are not directly attacking yourself.

This post divulged slighty from intended topics but it was very useful for clarifying some thoughts for me. Hopefully it wasn’t too hard to read. Although I outlined my issues with solution one (do good things) and discussed some thoughts on solution two (changing perspective on what good is) hopefully you have come to same realisation I have that both are required and it is important to both feel good about doing the work so you can keep going, and try and get back on track quickly when you don’t do the work.