How to build your 'uncomfortable' muscle? #Issue 36
Welcome back to another issue of Monday Madness :D
Good morning folks,
The struggle of waking up at 5:30 AM has been an on-going battle. A week ago, I found myself living in Great Yarmouth doing testing at a customer site - so my defaulted wake time was 5:30 am. It is exactly what I wanted, what I structured my mindset to behave under.
Coming back home, I found myself in the comfort of my room - with no challenges, no restrictions, and no uneasiness. And, that has resulted in a wake-up time of 7:00 AM.
I was assertive with myself to follow my discipline for waking up at 5:30 AM. As I become comfortable in a known environment that discipline went down the drain. This led me to think about how environmental factors play an extensive role in being disciplined.
So...
How does one become uncomfortable in a comfortable environment?
As I thought about this question - I listed out areas of my life that I could become better disciplined at:
Taking a cold shower.
Practice intermittent fasting twice a week.
Practice waking up at 5 AM.
It's so simple to list out things that make us uncomfortable, but our natural inclination to feel uncomfortable has never been ingrained in our mindset. We have sought after comfort and we will continue to do so in future.
However, in the practice of shifting away from this mindset, I decided to view being uncomfortable as a muscle. So test out this experiment, I created a process called 'the uncomforted zone'.
Here's what I've done.
This experiment would aim to test my comfort level two to three times a week. To start building that uncomfortable muscle and with progression, I will increase my ‘reps’ in the following week. I’ve also added a comment column to narrow down on my reasoning as to why I didn't complete a particular task.
It’s an initial start to a new experiment with a new process that I highly feel confident about.
Well that’s all for this week.
Abhishek
Check my home out on the internet 🏡 - abhisheknair.org
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Snippet of Value
Article - I’ve been soo conscious about accumulating books - that I second guess myself before purchasing another book. Previously, I worked to the idea that I need to finish reading my initial collection before adding another one to the library. Coming across this article has changed that notion - the idea that the collection of unread books is to be viewed as a source of information of varied interest.
As Scottish scientist James Clerk Maxwell once said: “Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science.”
A library filled with unread books is a reminder of everything we don’t know.
A quote that I’m pondering on -
Don’t worry about everything you post being perfect. Science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon once said that 90 percent of everything is crap. The same is true of our own work. The trouble is, we don’t always know what’s good and what sucks. That’s why it’s important to get things in front of others and see how they react.
Book: Show your Work by Austin Kleon
Podcast - The Inforium - Deliberate Practice
In this podcast, the speakers highlight the deliberate practice should be based on:
Observing how others do things and in the process replicating the same process for yourself. An example would when initially learning to play the piano, you would follow the rules and processes your teachers before adding your method.
You must proceed with the right intention of practice - that will enable you to find the correct process to get where you want.
Deliberate practice can be tasking and if you're an athlete it can be painful. It's necessary to consider learning takes place when it's difficult. If it's easy you're just practising what you already know.
Finally, this is somewhat similar to my initial point "copying" - learning in detail, understand the learning language of others and from that add to your repertoire.
What I’m looking forward to using - Aeropress Go!