#11 On habit formation

.. and other random things

Have you ever considered engineering your entire life? Making habits that will be helpful in your personal and professional life? Planning out the entire future such that you will not forget or miss an item? Most of us cannot do so. More importantly, many people don’t like the idea of engineering their lives. I don’t want to know what meal I will have this Friday night, or what book I will read after six months or which place I will visit for holidays, two years from now. Similarly, it is hard to decide what I will be doing every morning, from 6 am to 7 am. If I plan out the holidays for the next 3 years, it feels like I am missing out on many good choices and pre-planned locations becomes less appealing. However, if I go with the flow and do things with last-minute planning, it is more likely that I will visit fewer places than the one with planning.

Recently I made a rule that I will read 15 minutes every morning. Long before when someone suggested this, it was not appealing. The reason was like ‘ oh then I will only read 15 minutes, and that is not enough to finish even 2 books in a month’. And I end up taking more than 2-3 months to finish one book. But ever since the 15 min rule, I am reading more than 15 mins every day.

The spontaneity of life and opportunity costs

Why an engineered life feels less exciting even though you know it will be more effective than going with the flow? It is the fear of losing the spontaneity of life. The unexpected pleasures are much enjoyable than the planned ones. One of the best Biriyani I had was from a train station at Kannur. I was travelling from Shornur to Ahmedabad on a night train, and I did not have any food packed. The Biriyani that I got from the platform was exceptionally good. This was an unexpected pleasure. If I had ordered before from some famous restaurant, that meal will not be this memorable.

Spontaneous efforts feel more rewarding than consistent ones. We vouch for the Karate kid who had no formal training than the one who is well trained. We reward the unexpected performance more than the consistent one. There is a monotony associated with every consistent practice or habit. To me, this is the biggest challenge in building a new habit.

Opportunity cost is the loss that we have to take for making a particular choice. When I am choosing to go to play badminton, I am losing the opportunity of using that time to read more, or watch a movie or prepare dinner. By deciding to do one thing, you are opting out of doing several other things. This is why often we feel decision fatigue. If there are no other choices, we cannot long for the road not taken. In most cases, the choices are overwhelming. So if you decide your entire future or habits, you are certainly going to miss the other things that you want to do. Workout for a marathon or building muscles, learn guitar or join a creative writing group, take a DIY hands-on project or a coding one for a hobby, reserve 30 mins for writing or reading or going for a walk.. the list is endless.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black. — Road not Taken by Robert Frost

When you choose a habit that you want to build, you choose it for the rest of your life. That is scary, to be honest. If I decide on writing every morning, I won’t have time to do other interesting stuff, say practice a musical instrument or go for a run. This causes discomfort and fear of missing out. By choosing to do one activity we are deciding that we will not be doing any other things. The hundreds of roads not taken make us stay at the intersection parallelized and terrified to choose one path and move forward.

At this point, in any motivational or productivity article, you will look for closure. Yes, you have defined the problem, now tell me the solution. I have read books and articles about such topics, which gives some practical advice. But finally, my life is the same (is it though?). Trust me, I am not trying to stand out and say all these motivational books are bad. You can consume them as much as you like. But are you afraid of the real equation, “ how much of these techniques you are implementing?”. So I don't have a solution, but I can share my thoughts.

I read Atomic habits by James Clear. I think this was one of the most discussed books recently in the genre of self-help/behavioural science. The book stands out from the normal motivation noise. I thought sharing some take-home messages will be helpful. 

The change doesn’t have to start with you

Most of the motivational material will focus on the changes that you can bring. Be self-disciplined, fight against the flow, don’t sleep, set goals etc. But James clear starts with the surroundings. Your every behaviour, good or bad, are formed from hundreds of cues from your surroundings. A good example is the drug addict’s relapse after rehab. In rehab, you have a supporting environment, surrounded by people who came for getting help, and there is little access to drugs. But once you are out you are coming back to the old place, the atmosphere changes. Your bed, tables, fridge, cupboard and friends will remind you about the old habit and there is a limit you can resist with your willpower. The practical solution the book offers is to change the environment. Like keeping books near to your sleeping bed or placing healthy food more accessible than junk food or joining a runners club or badminton club. By changing the surrounding, you can develop better habits. 

Another practical tool is to associate the habit with one of your routines. For example, recently I started toilet reading. Instead of taking the phone, I decided to carry my kindle. By this method, I read at least once every day. And in most cases, I used to continue reading instead of reaching out for the phone. 

The boredom rule

There is a usage in Malayalam that is translated as “initial-only enthusiasm” ( ആരംഭ ശൂരത്വം). When you start something new, you are excited and committed. The initial success will be motivating, and the enthusiasm remains for some days. Then comes the hard part. Your incentives are less for continuing the effort. It is no more rewarding, and you want to jump to something exciting.

“Don’t lose the Rihas, Chithrabhai” my late Bansuri guru used to say. At the age of 95, he used to do his practice every day. He used to emphasise that Rihas (practice) is what makes a great artist, more than inborn talent. You may be very talented, but without regular practice, you won’t get better, he used to say. Taking up the flute, or going to the gym or cleaning up the dishes even on a low energy day is the key to sustaining the habits you want to build. At this point, you need to bring back your discipline and fight the boredom.

The inconsistency spell

Reflecting on the last year I became a bit low thinking that I have been inconsistent. But on second thought, I realised that I am not considering the timescale. This is the one point that I felt the Atomic could have discussed. I have been consistent if you considered a time scale of a month or two weeks. I did not have two weeks without any physical exercise or writing or reading. But if you consider days or sometimes week periods, there will be inconsistencies. If you reduce the timescale of consistency you will succeed in having a sustainable habit. It doesn’t have to be the same for all of your activities. You cannot run 5k every day. But for reading you need it to be daily (again choices).

The dangers of routine

It takes a lot of time and energy to engineer a new habit. But what is next? When do you replace an old habit with the new? When things become routine, we tend to make it effortless. Less thought is given to the activity. But often we fail to reflect on the relevance. Listening to audiobooks or podcasts while commuting, is a habit for me. But often I find myself just listening without engagement and forgetting the stuff I consume. Without reflecting on our actions, we will be living on the sweet lie that everything is going according to plan. On the other hand, the result of one routine won't be clear so soon.

Long-term or short-term gain

This thought came after listening to Amit Varma from his famous podcast Seen and the Unseen. We tend to overestimate the short-term goal and underestimate the long-term goal. If you doubt this statement just go to your gym. People who want to build a steamy body will do the hard work and expect to get a six-pack in a month. But when they see there is no immediate result, most people quit. But someone who started slow and continues to go to your workouts has a better chance of building the dream body. I experienced it in running. I took up running during the 2020 lockdown. One motivation was the idea of going outside without a mask. When I started, I barely was able to finish 500m without stopping due to the shortness of breath. I tried to push hard and the result was disheartening. Am I getting old? Whether I will be able to run 2-3 km continuously without a break? But I kept on track. After 5-6 weeks, I finished a 5K without stopping.

But, didn't you see the irony in the last two sections? If you don't follow a habit long enough, you won't see any positive results. However, if you follow the routine mindlessly, you may end up far away than expected. What required is a sweet balance of reflection and long-term practice. I know, easy to preach, hard to follow.

I chose this topic since the new year is around the corner and this is the time of reflection. So before stepping into new year resolutions, it's worthwhile doing a reflection on the last year. About the habits that you can form and the failures and struggles. This will help you to have more focused plans for getting tangible results.

Other random things

1. James Webb telescope has been successfully deployed by NASA. This is the most exciting news for a science enthusiast. This is the follower of the Hubble telescope. Hubble is the large telescope in space that proved the accelerated expansion of the universe. However, the Webb telescope is 100 times better than Hubble. Expect more amazing discoveries of unknown parts of the universe

   

2. I have been following the knowledge project podcast. Their last episode is the best of 2021. Have a look https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly90aGVrbm93bGVkZ2Vwcm9qZWN0LmxpYnN5bi5jb20vcnNz/episode/ZTllOTBjNWUtNTc2OC00OTdiLTlhYTctYzljMzMzMjZmNWE4?ep=14a

3. I read a book called Lady Doctors by Kaita Rao. A wonderful book about the struggles of the first Indian women in medicine. The backdrop of the book is the Indian freedom struggle. And you will be surprised to know how many of our celebrated leaders sabotaged women's struggle.

4. I am reading Tony Joseph's early Indians. I am amazed how much I did not know about human settlements in the world. All of us have descended from one group that left Africa 70000 years ago. The theory is that humans left Africa and reached Asia through the Arabian desert and started settlement up to Australia. The oldest human (homo sapiens) skeleton in Australia dates back to 65000 years. But in the Indian subcontinent, the oldest dated skeleton in only 35000 years ago (one obtained from Sri Lanka). Where are the missing skeletons? Humans reached Europe 45000 years ago while there were Neanderthal people living. The Neanderthal got extinct around 40000 years ago. There must have been a blood bath in the intersecting years. But on the other hand, Europeans possess 2% DNA of Neanderthal. So it was not all fighting. I'm excited to finish the book. Will update you back on this.

5. I started listening to a podcast explaining world war 2 in detail. Here is the first episode https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cDovL3dvcmxkd2FyaWlwb2RjYXN0Lm5ldC93b3JkcHJlc3MvZmVlZA/episode/ZjQ0NGZiNjAtMDYxNi0xMWU4LTk5ZTItZDdjMTA2YWI2YzE3?ep=14

6. I finally managed to get a domain. Now, www.chithrabhanu.com is live. The website is just in making. You will see more in this domain next year.