Can you remember a moment when you experienced effortless focus while doing something that you were completely absorbed, that time stood still? Athletes call it being in “The Zone.” Psychologists have studied this mental state which they call flow. Csikszentmihalyi, author of Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience described “The flow experience has the potential to make life more rich, intense, and meaningful; it is good because it increases the strengths and complexity of the self.”
Flow is defined as the intense experiential involvement in moment-to-moment activity, which can be either physical or mental. Attention is fully invested in the task at hand and the person functions at her or his fullest capacity.
If you keep getting interrupted, you cannot achieve the state of deep concentration needed to be in flow. My 3-step approach to achieve flow:
1. Quiet the mind
The subconscious mind is pre-occupied about tasks we have not completed. It works in the background to help us plan tasks. Being aware that attention is limited and finite, I write down and schedule what’s on my mind, so I don’t have to worry about remembering. I know if I don’t, it will deplete my attention and energy. When you write down a thought, you extract and capture it on paper. This process stops your mind from allocating attention and energy to that thought.
2. Remove distractions
Being constantly interrupted is a sure-fire way to kill flow. Our brain does not work well with distractions. I’m sure you are familiar with the buzz from your smartphone that triggers you to check your screen. Whenever you encounter an interruption, your brain must disengage with what it was doing and engage the distraction. After the distraction, it takes time for the brain to re-engage back in what you were doing. This process requires effort and is taxing to the brain. The conditions in my environment play a significant part to get in a state of flow. I optimise my environment by taking care of anything that might distract me. I switch my smartphone on airplane mode, clear my desk of things that distract me, quit email applications and adjust the thermostat in the room.
3. Focus is key to achieve flow
I take a moment to anticipate my needs. I drink water to stay hydrated, take a deep breath in and exhale. The deep breathing primes the brain to be in the present moment. I stretch my body to increase my energy levels. I concentrate completely on the task at hand. To drop in a state of flow, it’s crucial to be able to focus your attention and be completely absorbed by the activity.
Nine elements you need to achieve flow
Csikszentmihalyi has identified nine elements required for the flow experience:
1) balance of challenges vs. skills- If the challenge is too demanding compared to your skill level, you get frustrated. If it is too easy, you get bored. In a flow experience, you feel engaged by the challenge, but not overwhelmed because of an equal balance between the skill level and the challenge.
2) merging of action and awareness- the mind wanders, you often think about something that happened or might happen. In flow, you are completely immersed by what you do. Your thought and action are combined.
3) clear goals- a clear purpose and good grasp of what you want to accomplish
4) unambiguous feedback- clear and immediate evaluation of the process
5) complete concentration- if you want to experience flow, you need to be in complete concentration. In other words, you exclude unnecessary distractions and focus on the relevant activity
6) loss of self-consciousness- the experience of letting go of the self. When you are immersed in an activity, you feel connected to the activity and the self disappears.
7) sense of control- an absolute sense of personal control. You know what has to be done and you just do it.
8) transformation of time- when you are intensely engaged in the moment you become unaware of the passage of time.
9) activity for the sake of activity- the activity in itself is intrinsically rewarding
Conclusion
Being in flow enhances the momentary experience we live and contributes to our happiness and success. Flow can boost productivity while injecting a sense of enjoyment to the activities you do. You can use flow to learn a new skill, in sports or even your workplace. Achieving a state of flow enables a person to do extraordinary things.
Most people miss opportunities that can bring moment of joy and happiness everyday because they don’t appreciate good things happening to them. Gratitude (Great Attitude) is a pathway to happiness many of us don’t practice. I know what you are thinking. Give me a break! Gratitude is so cliché. Let me run through a couple of questions we all experience and tell me if this sounds like you.
Do you focus on things you don’t have? Do you think you will be happy if you have more?
You probably answered yes to both questions like most of us. Sometimes, we don’t realise the good things and people in our life. We start to take them for granted. We often get caught up in things that don’t go our way. Before we know it, we have sabotaged our own happiness.
The hedonic treadmill
Humans adapt to the good things in life quickly and do not appreciate what we have. We don’t realise the true value of many things in life until we lose them. It becomes a pattern that causes us to overlook everyday beauty and positive things. We are busy chasing the next big thing. We fall into the trap that the grass is always greener on the other side. Envy is a natural emotion every human being experiences. We can’t help comparing ourself to other people who have more. As a result, we frequently miss opportunities of happiness and connection.
Emmons & McCullough define gratitude as a two-step process. Firstly, “recognizing that one has obtained a positive outcome” and then secondly “recognizing that there is an external source for this positive outcome.”
A powerful gratitude practice
Three Good Things is a gratitude practice developed by Professor Martin Seligman. It involves recounting three positive things and considering the sources of each goodness. Writing down the Three Good Things counteract hedonic adaptation and promotes the savouring of positive life experiences and situations. Instead of constantly dwelling on negative things, the practice of gratitude magnifies positive things in our lives. This could be waking up to a new day, a stranger letting the door open or someone offering you a cup of tea. If you want to learn how to get rid of common toxic thoughts pattern, read Free Yourself From These 3 Toxic Thought Patterns
Gratitude journal
Keeping a gratitude journal enables us to cultivate gratitude consistently. You might think oh journaling is not for me. It takes so much effort. I don’t want to sit down and think about the past. A pen and paper can serve as a powerful life tool. When you write down your thoughts and emotions, you get to learn more about yourself. It offers you a glimpse into your working mind like no other method can. Write down what went well in details, reflect on the experience and feelings the events made you feel at the time and later. Write down why you think an event happened and if people were involved. The exercise can buffer negative thoughts especially when you have a bad day. Cultivating gratitude allowed me to refocus my mind on the positive that came from these events.
For example: I faced some IT problems that prevented me from printing scripts or letters from my computer. As a result, it delayed my clinic and caused much irritation. I had to ask someone else to print the documents several times. During my break, I phoned one of the admin staff about the problem who offered to come down promptly and the problem was solved. I was grateful someone kindly came to sort the situation. Three Good Things required some efforts, but I found it easier as I kept at it. For a step-by-step guide of the Three Good Things visit The Greater Good Science Center
Conclusion
Research has shown gratitude had lasting positive effects on health and wellbeing over time. Cultivating gratitude is a great way to capture and savour moments that would have otherwise been dismissed. If you want to increase your levels of happiness, optimism and hope Three Good Things might be the gratitude practice for you.
A little over a decade ago, I had a dream. It was to become a doctor. I was good at science and was up for a challenge. Back then, I didn’t know whether I could make it or not. Growing up, I didn’t have much confidence talking to people. That dream seemed unreachable to realise. My mentor believed in me when I didn’t know what possibilities existed. I set out a goal to work on my dream. My family supported me to run with it. I had a fire in my belly and took a series of actions to make it happen. Competition to get into medicine was fierce and I was ready to put in the work and time needed.
Getting into Medical school
I applied to four Universities through UCAS and hoped to get in. Two Universities invited me for interview. The first interview didn’t go well because I didn’t prepare enough. What seemed to be a failure from the the first interview became an invaluable preparation for my second interview. I learnt from my mistakes and spent more time to practice for the second interview. Three out of the four Universities rejected my application. The rejections were disappointing. I waited the last University to respond and hoped for the best. I was one offer away from my dream. A few weeks later, I received a phone call. Someone from Manchester Medical School admission informed me I was offered a seat. I almost lost faith until that phone call. I still remember the conversation like yesterday.
The reality of being a doctor
As a young college student, I didn’t really know what I signed myself up for. Getting in Medical School was only the start. I re-invented myself at University and stepped outside my comfort zone. I enrolled in public speaking course, volunteered and talked to more people. It takes patience, perseverance and hard work to become a doctor. The long hours, night shifts, and lack of sleep were disturbing. The first year working as a doctor was a steep learning curve. There were days when I asked myself whether I had made the right choice. I’m glad I didn’t quit even when the going got tough. I learnt to prioritise my wellbeing and continued my journey.
If you can dream it, you can do it.
Walt Disney
Without perseverance, hard work and support from family and friends my dream would not have come to fruition. Sometimes, we might think there are giant obstacles on the roads to our dreams and feel like quitting. Most people quit on their dreams without even starting. If you are reading this article, perhaps you have a dream and have put it on hold or you have talked yourself out of it. I’d like to ask you an important question and I want you to be honest with yourself. What is your dream and what are you doing about it?
The concept the “circle of competence” was developed by Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger to focus on investing in areas they knew best and avoiding areas they didn’t understand.
What an investor needs is the ability to correctly evaluate selected businesses. Note that word “selected”: You don’t have to be an expert on every company, or even many. You only have to be able to evaluate companies within your circle of competence. The size of that circle is not very important; knowing its boundaries, however, is vital.
Allocating limited resources
The circle of competence mental model is useful beyond the world of investing. It is applicable in every aspect of life. While you may not consider yourself an investor, you allocate time and attention in every activity you undertake daily. Most of us do not think much about how we allocate our limited time and attention. If we treat the allocation of our limited resources as investment, we can utilize our time, energy and attention more effectively.
Your circle of competence
Understanding your circle of competence is key in identifying and selecting opportunities that match your knowledge, skills and expertise. In other words, when you understand what you know and what you don’t, you are able to decide where you devote your time. Importantly, you recognize when something is outside of the perimeter of your competence and are never afraid to say
I don’t know.
However, when an opportunity within your circle of competence presents itself, you can confidently make a decision to allocate your resources knowing you have an edge. You want to keep learning and slowly expand that circle.
It is vital to understand the boundaries of your circle of competence if you want to succeed. I hope you enjoyed this article. I will let Tom Watson Sr., Founder of IBM, conclude this week email with one of his brilliant quotes:
“I’m no genius. I’m smart in spots—but I stay around those spots.”
Schooling is an important process that imparts knowledge and develops skills. Most people associate learning with formal education. While education typically ends after one graduates university, learning doesn’t stop after formal education. Learning is not confined to the four walls of a classroom but takes place throughout life in different environments.
Lifelong learning in the medical field
In my world, approximately half of what I have learnt at University is not valid today. In the medical field, facts have short half-life. The knowledge we considered as fact several years or a decade ago expires with new discovery.
Prior to 1982, the scientific community considered stress and lifestyle problems as the main causes of peptic ulcer disease and gastritis. Dr Marshall and Dr Warren challenged the medical doctrine and rejected the existing knowledge at the time considered as fact. Their curiosity and relentless pursuit to learn resulted in the discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori and its role in gastritis and peptic ulcer disease. The pair’s finding radically changed our understanding and overturned previous view. Dr Marshall and Dr Warren jointly won the Nobel Prize in Medicine 2005 for their discovery.
Doctors are lifelong learners who dedicate their time to enhance their understanding and be up to date with current knowledge. They ask questions, reflect on existing knowledge and sometimes challenge the status quo. The COVID-19 pandemic is an example of the rapid changes in scientific knowledge which require constant learning. New articles on the SARS-COV 2 virus are published in peer-reviewed journals weekly. A doctor needs to know the latest scientific knowledge to practice evidence-based medicine.
How to become a lifelong learner?
The opportunities to further one’s knowledge and develop new skills throughout life are endless. We can learn from reading journals and books, listening to podcasts and watching educational videos. You cannot learn to swim by reading a book and staying dry. You got to dip your body in the water. Learning is an active process and there is no substitute to personal experience. We learn not only from our experiences but from the experiences of others.
Surgeon William Halsted is believed to have introduced the maxim: “See one, do one, and teach one”. Halsted’s traditional method of learning is still in use in the medical field. In other words, the three steps of acquiring a new skill involves:
See one-observation of someone performing a procedure(Shadow)
Do one-perform the procedure under supervision (Direct feedback and experience)
Teach one-teach others reinforce the teacher’s learning (Understand the How and why and pass the knowledge on)
Conclusion
Learning is an enriching process that has infinite upside. The road to success is lifelong learning. Successful people are lifelong learners who are always improving themselves. I’m going to let Charlie Munger conclude this article on lifelong learning with one of his brilliant quotes “Go to bed smarter than when you woke up.”
We make thousands of decisions every day, yet most of us have not been taught how to make better decision. Doctors make critical decisions daily. The consequences of these decisions impact upon the lives of people. Sometimes, the quality of decision determines outcomes between life and death.
Making decision is a complex process that requires an ability to process relevant information, apply diverse mental frameworks and exercise sound judgement. We are going to discuss 3 frameworks every great thinker carries in his toolkit to make better decisions.
Are you a lateral thinker?
Doctors are trained to approach problem in a selective, analytical, and sequential way. They are conditioned to think vertically. We will get into logical and linear reasoning in a moment.
Can we use vertical thinking to tackle every single problem?
As the adage goes “If your only tool is a hammer, then every problem looks like a nail.” Applying vertical thinking to every problem is like pounding everything with a hammer.
Lateral thinking is a term coined by Edward de Bono. He described an approach that rejects the ‘status quo’ of ideas and conceives new creative ways to address challenges. In other words, lateral thinking is to move away from conventional line of reasoning and embrace creative solutions by thinking outside the box. An inquisitive mind is crucial to think laterally. Innovations in medicine often stem from lateral thinking.
Lateral thinking in medicine
Prior to the 1982 discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori, the prevailing scientific knowledge considered stress and lifestyle problems as the main causes of peptic ulcer disease and gastritis. Dr Marshall and Dr Warren challenged the medical doctrine and rejected the status quo. Marshall’s approach in proving that H. pylori caused inflammation of the stomach gives us a glimpse of lateral thinking in action. He deliberately infected himself by swallowing a culture of the bacterium and developed gastritis. Marshall underwent endoscopy and stomach biopsy. The presence of H.pylori in the tissue samples proved the causative effect of the bacterium.
The discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori and its role in gastritis and peptic ulcer disease radically changed our understanding and overturned previous view. Dr Marshall and Dr Warren jointly won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2005 for their discovery. The recognition of peptic ulcer disease as an infectious disorder has opened the way to a simple cure by eradicating the causative agent. A key component of the pair’s breakthrough is credited to their ability to think laterally.
Thinking outside the box
You probably know Leonardo da Vinci for his painting of The Mona Lisa. This masterpiece was undoubtedly a product of lateral thinking. Da vinci possessed an incredibly inquisitive mind and did not limit himself to one discipline. He combined interdisciplinary knowledge from anatomy, botany and mathematics in his paintings, experiments and inventions. In other words, he thrived being a generalized specialist.
Second-order thinking
“Failing to consider second- and third-order consequences is the cause of a lot of painfully bad decisions, and it is especially deadly when the first inferior option confirms your own biases. Never seize on the first available option, no matter how good it seems, before you’ve asked questions and explored.”—Ray Dalio
In Thinking Fast And Slow book, Daniel Kahneman described two systems of thinking: system 1 and system 2. First order thinking is simple and easy. It is driven by system 1 thinking which is intuitive, fast and emotional. Most people are first order thinkers. They solve for immediate problems without thinking of the 2nd, 3rd or Nth order consequences.
Second order thinkers look past the immediate consequences of a decision. They consider the long-term consequences of a decision, analyse the impacts of an intervention at a micro and a macro level. Second-order thinkers see things that others can’t see. They see upstream, downstream and avoid potentially negative consequences by anticipating and planning their next moves. Second order thinking involves system 2 thinking which is more deliberative and more logical. It takes a lot of effort to become a second-order thinker. Many people don’t engage system 2 and rely only on system 1. Kicking the can down the road hoping the problem will go away delays dealing with a serious problem.
Examples
First order thinking: “After a long shift at work, let’s eat a chocolate bar and watch Netflix. I’ve earned it.” Consequence: You satisfy your craving at the expense of sabotaging your health by choosing a sedentary lifestyle.
Second order thinking: “I’ve had a long shift at work, let’s go for a run and get some fresh air.” Consequence: You understand the benefits of movement to your body and develop a healthy post-work routine. This choice may seem difficult in the short term.
System 1 thinking is an effective model for most decisions we make every day. Many unimportant decisions can be processed with first order thinking. It is intuitive and effortless.
If we didn’t use system 1 thinking and only applied system 2 thinking for every decision, life would be impractical.
System 2 thinking is more effortful and slower. We benefit from applying it in our most important decisions.
Why do we need to consider the worst case scenario?
Scenario planning is an invaluable tool good decision maker can’t ignore. Being optimistic about the future doesn’t mean you should ignore the worst-case scenario. Considering the worst-case scenario helps in managing risks should a potential disaster emerge. The thought process of conceiving the worst possible outcome enables you to develop contingency plans to prepare for the worst. Nobody knows what the future holds. Planning for the worst-case scenario is taking measures to mitigate unnecessary risks.
Conclusion
Good outcome doesn’t always follow good decision. Sometimes, a good decision can lead to a negative outcome. While we can’t control every outcome we can control every decision we make. We make tons of decision every day that shape our life. What separate great decision makers from the pack is their ability to apply diverse frameworks to consistently make good decisions with sound judgement.
Have you ever found yourself running late? It happens to all of us. The other day at work, I saw a patient with chest pain and it took me half an hour to arrange hospital admission. Sometimes, we need to spend extra time to manage patient with complex needs. This may well delay the rest of the clinic. We might not control what comes through the door but we can control our productivity. If you want to do more with less, this article is for you. By the end of this article, you will learn three productivity tips to gain more time and more energy.
Productivity Tip #1 Adjust your cursor speed
This is easy to implement. Most of us have our computer mouse cursor speed set at a default speed. Chances are the default setting is slowing your navigation process to move the cursor from one side to the other. You can increase the speed of your mouse cursor to a faster setting for better performance. This simple adjustment will save you time and energy each time you use your mouse. Go to mouse settings and increase the pointer speed.
Productivity Tip #2 Learn to type faster
A significant chunk of our time goes in documenting consultation in the patient’s record. This is typically performed by typing on a computer keyboard. Imagine how efficient you would be if you could type faster and with fewer errors. The speed at which a person types can be improved with training. A few hours of practice can increase a person’s speed from 30 to 70 Words per minute. A free resource you can use to type faster with more accuracy is Keybr. Typing accurately reduces the use of time and energy in correcting typing errors.
Productivity Tip #3 Learn to speed read
Increase your reading speed without losing comprehension. We often read endless discharge letters, patients’ records, reports of investigations and so on everyday. It is time consuming to read so many texts. Imagine the benefits of reading faster. Like typing, reading is a skill you can learn to be faster. The first technique is to highlight the line you read to guide your eyes. You could also use your finger to guide your gaze. The second technique is to limit your eye movements to the center of the text. We typically read by scanning our gaze left, center and right. By limiting the range of eye movement and focusing on the center, we can train our peripheral vision to read text at borders without having to scan from margin to margin. You therefore reduce the saccadic eye movements and process information faster.
Building and embedding good habits are key components to be consistently productive. These 3 productivity tips will enable you to do more with less only if you apply them. By combining all three practical tips, you can make significant gain in productivity and be better equipped next time your clinic runs late.
A common trait highly successful people exhibit is their ability to delay gratification. They have a long-term future focus. We all know patience is a virtue. Most of us know in the back of our mind we ought to think long term.
We want everything now
Yet, we favour choices that bring us instant gratification over delayed gratification. We live in a culture where we expect to get everything we want instantly and we want it now! We’ve all grown accustomed to favour the present and care less about the future. While living in the moment and experiencing things in the now has benefits, we also need to account for the future.
According to Sigmund Freud, the mind tends to seek pleasure and avoid pain to satisfy biological and psychological needs. You might notice children’s behavior to seek pleasure in satisfying their cravings of hunger and thirst or whatever they want in the moment. As a child matures to become an adult, he is able to think ahead and delay gratification.
The Marshmallow Experiment
In the late 1960s, researchers at Stanford university conducted a series of study on delayed gratification, known as the “Marshmallow Experiment.” They gave children the option to have one marshmallow now or delay getting a marshmallow for a period of time and then get two marshmallows instead. The researchers tracked the children more than 10 years later. The children who were able to wait longer for the preferred rewards performed better in health and fitness, academic achievements and financial performance.
What can we learn from Amazon’s success?
Every successful person has mastered the ability to delay gratification. If there’s someone we could learn from, it has to be Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon. Bezos constantly stresses the importance of long-term thinking. He grew amazon from a small online bookstore to an industry giant.
The overnight success took many years of perseverance. Amazon was chronically unprofitable for many years. In the early years of Amazon, many people argued that perhaps the company was fundamentally broken, that it would never be profitable and would fail. Most people were impatient, short-sighted and concerned about short-term gains. They misunderstood Bezos who remained steadfast in his grand plan committed to long-term investment and value creation. We see the philosophy of Bezos in the motto of Blue Origin, the space exploration company he founded: “Gradatim Ferociter,” meaning “Step by Step ferociously” in English.
This is what Jeff Bezos said about focusing in the long-term: “If everything you do needs to work on a three-year time horizon, then you’re competing against a lot of people, But if you’re willing to invest on a seven-year time horizon, you’re now competing against a fraction of those people, because very few companies are willing to do that. Just by lengthening the time horizon, you can engage in endeavours that you could never otherwise pursue. At Amazon we like things to work in five to seven years. We’re willing to plant seeds, let them grow—and we’re very stubborn. We say we’re stubborn on vision and flexible on details.”
Buying a car for the first time
When I decided to buy my first car, I had the choice to purchase a brand-new car or a used car. A car is a liability that comes with regular expenses: new tires, repair, gas, car insurance and so on. A brand new car is an even bigger liability as the expenses are higher. In 5 years, a brand-new car loses 60% of its initial value of what you bought it for. I could have easily borrowed money to buy a new expensive car. There is nothing wrong with buying a new car.
Did I want a brand-new car? somewhat Did I need one? NO, I needed a vehicle to take me from point A to B.
So I decided to buy a used car because I didn’t need a brand new. In my case buying a used car was the right long-term decision. This stopped me from borrowing money to buy a liability that immediately goes down in value. Delaying short term gratification enabled me to be debt free and focus on long term investment.
Easy vs hard choice
Pursuing the easy route by satisfying immediate urges and cravings may seem to be a good choice in the moment. In the beginning, you don’t feel any pain and you get instant gratification.If we treat life as a series of short term, the pain will start to accumulate over time, growing every day that passes by.We are witnessing an epidemic of obesity in the Western world. Lifestyle choices play a vital part in our health.
Most people don’t exercise and see it as a chore. It’s easier to be sedentary as this choice involves less effort. Let’s consider the following choices: A- sit on the sofa and watch Netflix B- going to the gym
Which option did you choose? Option A is more appealing because the person avoids the pain of working out at the gym and satisfies their pleasure of watching Netflix. Option B seems to be more difficult. It’s easier to choose A over B. Given the choice, most people will prefer to avoid pain and seek pleasure. Sacrificing long term health for short term gain has become a norm in our culture.
Conclusion
Delaying gratification is a route paved with discomfort. You might have to go through pain in the beginning. However, the pain decreases over time and you are rewarded in the long run. Your ability to delay gratification impacts upon your health, happiness and success.
It might be useful to ask yourself this question when you make a choice: How will it impact me in 5 years?
When Dr Stephen first came to me, he was desperate having failed MRCGP AKT multiple times. He lost all hope and self-esteem. The previous attempts deflated his confidence. Stephen was granted one last chance to sit the exam. He was nervous as this was his final attempt. It was make-or-break time. We worked together and broke down the limiting beliefs that held him back. We addressed his weaknesses and built on his strengths. It was a difficult process to unlearn old mental models and re-learn new ones to upgrade his mindset. Are you ready for the 3 steps?
See, Believe & Achieve
I was seeing massive changes. It paid up big time, beyond my imagination.
In this audio clip, Stephen recounts the struggles he faced sitting the AKT and the self-doubts that crushed his confidence. He lost hope and thought he was not good enough. His self-defeating mindset kept him hostage of his past. By applying the See, Believe & Achieve mental model, Stephen started seeing massive changes. His AKT score went from low 60s to 75.
Visualise the future you want
Let your creativity guide you. Think big! There is no limit to a man’s vision. Don’t worry how crazy your vision is. The crazier, the better. If you struggle to define your vision, know that the process can take time. Imagine yourself 10 years from today living your best life. What do you see? Can you visualise yourself working towards the vision you set?
Believe in yourself
You might think this one is a cliché. It may well be, do you know why? Every successful person believes in himself. Having envisioned the future you want, commit to make it a reality. It is vital to broadcast your vision to your mind daily. There is greatness in each individual. The potential is often wasted because people doubt themselves. Do not allow self-doubts or failures to stop your progress. Self-belief is crucial to be successful.
David J. Schwartz summarised the effects of your belief and disbelief in a couple of sentences:
“Belief releases creative powers.”
“Disbelief puts the brake on.”
If you don’t believe in yourself, your mind works against you. It produces all kind of excuses that lead to your defeat. When you believe in yourself, you start seeing possibilities that you previously didn’t realise were available.
Believing in yourself gives you power. A great way to cultivate self-belief is self-affirmation practice. Highly successful people have attributed a huge part of their success to positive affirmations and visualization. Will Smith and Arnold Schwarzenegger have publicly talked about the power of believing in yourself.
“In my mind, I’ve always been an A-list Hollywood superstar. Y’all just didn’t know yet.” ― Will Smith
“If I can see it and believe it, then I can achieve it.” ― Arnold Schwarzenegger
Time to take action
Most people do not take this step and they wonder why their visualisation and affirmation practices are not working. The last step is the most exciting one. Without execution, you can’t achieve anything in life. Take consistent actions that will enable you to achieve what you envisioned.
Conclusion
As Napoleon Hill once said “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve.”
When we let the mind generate doubts, negativity and self-defeating thoughts, it works against us. Many of us are trapped by our past failures and deny ourselves of the endless possibilities ahead. See, Believe & Achieve are three simple words that enabled Stephen to move past failures and succeed beyond his imagination. Working on your mindset is laying the foundation to your success. You can apply See, Believe & Achieve to realise your dreams and life goals.
The six logical levels of change proposed by Robert Dilts provide a useful model to understand ways we can achieve change at an individual and organisational level. The six logical levels are: purpose, identity, value/belief, capability, behaviour & environment.
Purpose: Why are you alive on this Earth?
This question may be hard to answer if you have never thought about your role in the wider world. Discovering your purpose in life is something that may take years. Most people will never find their purpose because they are not even trying. It may be hard to figure out your purpose if you have different interests and passions. Perhaps, you feel lost and don’t know where to start. That’s natural, everyone feels lost on their journey. It takes time, efforts and sacrifices to find your purpose. It is a self-discovery journey where you follow your own unique path.
So, where do you start?
You could start by pursuing one of your interests if you don’t know where to start. Learn, serve and contribute in that area of interest. Once you have gained sufficient experience, you will know if this is something you want to keep doing, or you may decide to move to something else. What you started with may change over time and you may find yourself with something different. Most people try different things before they discover their true purpose.
Finding your purpose and embracing it gives a sense of meaning to life. People with a strong sense of purpose lead a fulfilling life. They enjoy positive emotions and greater life satisfaction. When you have assigned yourself a life mission, you have something to look forward to every day. That mission gets you to jump out of bed in the morning. You feel you are part of something bigger than you. I’d like you to picture yourself being presented with a lifetime achievement award at the age of 80-year-old. What would your biggest contribution be?
Identity
If you asked someone “who are you?”
That person replied “I am a physician”
He identifies himself with his job.
People can identify to different areas of their life including their role at work, within the family, and in romantic relationships.
When was the last time you thought about your identity?
Identity is the way you view yourself. Identity encompasses memories, experiences, self-esteem and self-worth. Knowing thyself is crucial to live an authentic life. Self-awareness is key in understanding the self. It is shaped by our experience and choices we make. Identity formation is a matter of “finding oneself”. ‘Who am I?’ is a complex question that needs an in-depth exploration of one’s talents and potential with available social roles. Your identity is what defines you as a person. Identity is something that is malleable and develops as one confronts challenges and grow in life. People who have a strong sense of their identity enjoy happier and a more fulfilled in life.
Value and Belief
Everyone has personal values whether the person recognize them or not. Values are the fundamental beliefs dear to us that govern our lives. Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.”
When your thoughts, feelings and actions are in congruence to your personal values, you experience a sense of satisfaction and contentment.
Do you know your core values?
You need to take a deep look inside yourself to understand your core values. Being in alignment with your personal values make all the difference in the way you live and work. When your choices and actions are incongruent to your set of values, you may feel an internal stress and conflict. This is often a source of frustration and profound unhappiness.
Common personal core values are achievement, freedom, community, honesty, respect, love and integrity. Identifying and understanding your core values is a challenging exercise for many people. Being aware of what you value most is important and worth your time.
When you understand and honor your personal values, it’s easier to make crucial decisions. You are guided by a moral compass in decision-making to determine the best direction for you and your life goals.
Capability, skill and competence
Capability ranges from behaviours you do without conscious efforts to skills you have learned more consciously. Capabilities refer to plans, strategies, knowledge and skills needed to achieve a goal. It is considered the ‘how’ level, also known as competence.
Competence can be classified into 4 levels:
unconscious incompetence
conscious incompetence
conscious competence
unconscious competence
For instance, brushing your teeth might seem to be effortless for you. However, there was a time when you were unconsciously incompetent before you learned to consciously use a toothbrush. Then you developed your skill such that you don’t need anybody’s help to brush your teeth. Competencies can be learned and trained. Do you remember the first time you drove a car? How competent were you? The capabilities you might need to develop will be different to someone else’s capabilities. Successful people identify capabilities related to their purpose. They develop crucial skills, continuously learn and grow. Improving your skills with constant learning and consistent series of actions increase your capabilities. When you stack a skill on the other, you increase your value since the marketplace rewards people with valuable set of skills. You allow the compound effect principle working to your advantage thereby increasing your odds of success.
Do you know about the 1% rule?
“When you improve a little each day, eventually big things occur. When you improve conditioning a little each day, eventually you have a big improvement in conditioning. Not tomorrow, not the next day, but eventually a big gain is made. Don’t look for the big, quick improvement. Seek the small improvement one day at a time. That’s the only way it happens and when it happens, it lasts.” —John Wooden
I first read about the 1% rule in Atomic Habits from James Clear. The 1% rule is simple.
Focus on improving your capabilities by 1% each day. Just 1 %, no more. It might seem very little. In the beginning, the improvement will appear negligible. Rome wasn’t built in a day, neither will you. Great things take time to build. When you continually improve by 1% each day, those improvements start compounding on each other. Slowly, the good habits you develop stack over time. Several months later, the improvement you make in 1 day equals to what previously took you a few days to accomplish. When 1% compounds every day, it doubles every 72 days. If you continually improve yourself by just 1% each day, imagine the personal growth in your life at the end of this year.
Behaviour
“Our character is basically a composite of our habits. Because they are consistent, often unconscious patterns, they constantly, daily, express our character.” -Stephen Covey
Adopting a new habit or breaking an old one is notoriously hard. Human beings generally do not like change. We stick to old routines for various reasons that may include fear of the unknown or fear of failure. Researchers Prochaska and DiClemente were originally interested in why some smokers were able to quit on their own while others needed help. They found smokers quit only when they are ready to do so and discovered five stages that can be used to assess a person’s readiness to make change. Understanding the science of behavioural change has been insightful in enabling people to make lasting changes. The stages of change model have been an effective construct in understanding how people go through change successfully.
Three important considerations to modifying behaviour include:
Readiness to change
Barriers to change
Expect relapse
You could explain everything about healthy lifestyle to someone and be sorely disappointed at the end if you don’t know at what stage the individual is currently in. When someone is not ready to change, your information goes from one ear and out the other.
Stage 1 Precontemplation
During precontemplation stage, you have no conscious intention of making a change. People in this stage may not recognise their behaviour is unhealthy due to lack of awareness or information. Most people might be in denial and tend to avoid thinking about the unhealthy behaviour. For a person to move past precontemplation, you need to sense the unhealthy behaviour is holding you back from attaining important personal goals.
Stage 2 Contemplation
At this stage, people become increasingly aware that the behaviour is a problem. You consider the potential benefits of making a change and the weigh the cost. You may resist change as the costs tend to stand out. Ambivalence may cause you to re-weigh the benefits and cost. This stage can last over months or even years. You may experience conflicted emotions about changing as you view the time and effort involved in change. Most people prefer to be in their comfort zone and procrastinate.
The key to move to the next stage is a shift from an abstract idea to a belief that modifying your behaviour is beneficial to you. You need to ask yourself why you want to change. Congruent people tend to think of intrinsic reason to change. It might be helpful to make a list of pros and cons of behaviour change and identify barriers and think how to overcome them.
Stage 3 Preparation
During preparation stage, you are ready to start taking actions. This stage typically lasts a few weeks. You might take small steps that will prepare you to make the required change. People may share their plan to change to friends and family who may offer advice. Gather information about ways to change your behaviour and do your research.
It’s important to write down your goals and prepare a plan of action if you want to increase your chances of making a lasting change.
Stage 4 Action
Once you have a plan, you need to take direct action in order to accomplish your goals. If you don’t spend enough time in preparation, it is difficult to progress in action due to temptations from people or your environment. It’s important to fight urges that could cause you to slip back to old habits. When you work towards your goals, reward yourself for the positive behaviour. Reinforcement and support are extremely important to strengthen your commitment and move forwards. Remind yourself regularly of the belief in making change and the benefits that will come.
Stage 5 Maintenance
In maintenance stage, you have changed your behaviour and you need to turn it in a habit. Be aware of situations where you might be tempted to slip back to old habits. Avoid temptations and aim to replace these old habits with positive actions. Reward yourself if you can avoid a relapse. Surround yourself with supportive people whom you trust.
Relapse
Relapses commonly occur in behaviour change. If you lapse back to an old behaviour, don’t beat yourself up. Take it as a minor setback. Analyse what led to the relapse and identify possible triggers. Avoid the triggers in the future and don’t give up on yourself.
Environment
Environment encompasses everything outside of yourself. It is the state of the external context where people live. Your surrounding influences your thoughts, feelings and actions every day. The choice of clothing a person wears is heavily influenced by the climate. In the UK, people can be found wearing coats during winter. If you live in a tropical country, you don’t need a winter coat. Recognizing the impacts of environment on your livelihood is vital.
Meet John, a University student who wants to be healthier. He lives with his flat mate, Tom, who is less health conscious. John has decided to eat nutritious food. He wants to stop eating so much junk food. He made a good start by carefully selecting groceries and cook instead of ordering take-out. As the weeks went by, it became more difficult to stick with his routine. Cooking took significant time and effort while Tom ordered take-out almost everyday. The savor of the pizza Tom just ordered reminded John of the convenience of just ordering online. The temptation to fall back to old habit was very high.
We can observe environmental factors that antagonized John’s effort to be healthier. If John wants to adopt and maintain a healthy habit, he needs to consider the conditions in his environment. In order to set the best conditions to be healthy, John needs to start by talking to Tom. Imagine if John and Tom agreed to cook together and shared the chore. It would take less time if both chipped in. Cooking for 2 people is more cost-effective than cooking for one. John would not be exposed to cues that constantly remind him of fast food. Tom would cut his spending on take-out and eat nutritious meals. The environment in the flat would enable John to adopt a sustainable habit without resistance.
The odd of adopting and maintaining a habit is higher when you set the best conditions in your environment to work in your favor.
Conclusion
Being conscious of the six logical levels (purpose, identity, value/belief, capability, behaviour & environment) can help you understand at what level you are attempting to make change. Sometimes, we might waste time trying to make change at a lower level when we need to consider a higher hierarchical level to achieve that change. If you want to achieve a desired change in life, think about the logical level you are operating.
