Hack Your Habits!
Mind Hacking and habit manipulation have become quite a fascinating subject to me. I was forced to swap out habits due to health concerns and things got interesting.
Programming yourself is somewhat like writing code with the human condition element involved. I wanted to share a few thoughts based on some personal experiments I have conducted over this year. I started looking at my self-construct and tried to study my perspectives and habits using a simplified set of definitions. After putting a few modifiers to practice, I became surprised how much my life changed for the positive. These new habits were based on target goals that were in many ways children of my original perspectives. I know this sounds hokey, but bear with me.
Reality is What We Make of It
At our core we all look at reality differently than one another, I call these (Perspective Trends). As humans our naked framework generally stays unmodified and solid. Perspective trends with new experiences create modified versions that can solidify over time. This means your perspective makes experience become harder to change. Like habits, the more you invest in one the more it becomes a part of you. After making some major progress with my health and energy habits, I thought I would try to use the same approach. I set out to make some changes with my web design and software business.
The first step was identifying what I wanted to accomplish. I then created a mixed list with the items that I needed to accomplish. It was important that I was reasonable with these goals / targets. This is because most goals need perspective changes. Old perspectives in most cases are harder to modify than one would think.
New Perspectives Lead to Opportunities
Another interesting note about changing perspective is, other aspects of your life will change mostly for the better. Many of these aspects you might not expect. For example, Once I started enjoying healthier food and ignoring unhealthily food, not only did I lose weight, but my energy levels skyrocketed. In the process my overall mood and self image improved. I know that is a typical example, but it was spot on and what compelled me to write this article.
Perspective is the human lens of experience that shapes the world around you both internally and externally. Below is how I have broken down core perspective drivers.
Core Survival – Base Food – Shelter – Appropriation – Community – Religion: These are the standard framework requirements that shape our perspectives.
Fail | Reward: Core values that shape experience that in turn forge perspectives.
Fail – Positive – Driver + Constructor / Keeping at it / Learn From
Fail – Negative – Perspective Shift Stop / Ending Point
Reward– Positive Driver + Constructive / Continue / Improve
Reward – Negative Shift Stop / Ending Point / Don’t need to change / Laziness / There is not a better way
Trying a New Perspective/ Making the Switch.
To attempt to simplify the process I would like to break it down into steps that have worked for me. So far, we have our short list of items needing improvement. We don’t know quite yet what perspective we need to acquire or modify. Generally we have an idea on what habits might need to be associated.
With anything like this, the hardest part is getting the tinder to start the habit by changing your perspective. Most of the time a good start is trying to get yourself into a mindset. A open mindset that focuses on the benefits and fruits that habit is going to produce. This is common since I know, but allowing yourself to paint and frame the outcome is a key element. Try to make it into a personal game. A game you play with yourself.
The perspective is that you enjoy the habit and even want to go above and beyond the maintenance of that habit. What we don’t realize is that once our perspective changes other opportunities will be born from it. Opportunities that could be even more important ones that we are aware of.
The problem with being human is we all want to solve a problem, but need to see the results instantaneously. Our perception of (time) is in my opinion the hardest one to shape.
A simple but important example.
Perception is Subjective
I WILL
- I am going to start making changes to improve my life and the lives of others.
- I will now allow myself to avoid consuming foods and beverages that hinder my performance
- I will exercise and get better sleep because of it
- I will focus on things that are the most important and understand that this is a journey and not a destination.
I HAVE
- Flushed out my body of toxins and unreliable types of fuel
- Trusted and now rely on exercise to relieve my stress and improve my physique
- Improved my work and relationships by choosing the right directions during this journey
Once you acquire results, then tweaking, modifying and even adding new habits becomes less of a challenge.
Everyone generally knows this, but the question is do you perceive it? Continue to Change – Continue to grow and don’t be afraid to take a bulldozer to your old framework.
PS. I know this post is very abstract but I really wanted to get it out of my head 🙂
Markus Nelson
