A shift in mindset that's been essential in ending my bad habits.
It’s OK and important and crucial to set rules for yourself. But what we don’t realize is how friggen crucial it is to add an unspoken rule that says it’s ‘okay’ to falter.
The rules of meditation are dead simple.
Rule no. 1: Focus your attention on your breath.
... That’s it. There's just the one.
The genius thing about meditation however is the overarching unspoken rule of meditation, which is you’re sort-of allowed to lose focus on the breath.
Of course, this unspoken rule seems to contradict or negate the one hard rule, but somehow the practice still works. Because with meditation, it’s not just OK if you fail, it’s entirely expected—in fact, the act of “picking yourself back up when you fail” by returning your focus to the breath, is itself the practice.
When learning meditation, you’re taught to anticipate this. You’re told that when (and not if) that happens, you’re supposed to just note that it did and gently and kindly return to focusing on the breath.
No need to get critical of yourself—in fact, a side goal of meditation is to observe first-hand the frenetic circus of the mind. Judging yourself harshly or thinking of random things and going off on tangents is natural, and our job is simply to sit and observe it happening, then do what we can to reign it in and forgive ourselves when our subconscious takes over.
So what does this have to do with ending bad habits, procrastination and generally getting your life in order?
As someone with a decade+ experience with crippling bad habits who's made lots of progress in the last few years... I'd say everything.
All of us on this sub have our vices. From mindless scrolling of SM feeds, to junk food binges.
As gratifying as they may be, they cause us to coast and procrastinate. They lead to us feeling lousy and useless; to get frustrated and discouraged as they slowly scrub our chance at achieving our dream life.
So we tell ourselves, enough.
I’ve been there a million times over.
We try for moderation and it doesn’t work.
We try weaning off the vices; doesn’t work.
We attempt Cold-Turkey; doesn’t work.
We attempt Cold-Turkey again but harder; still doesn’t work.
We try Cold-Turkey super hard with super clear resolutions and a calendar with Xs and a post on social media that cries-out THAT’S IT PEOPLE, IM DONE, IM DECIDING TO GET BETTER aaaand… it doesn’t work.
Fugg.
It’s OK and important and crucial to set rules for yourself. I say, the clearer and more concrete the better.
But what we don’t realize is how friggen crucial it is to add that unspoken rule that says it’s ‘okay’ to falter.
This is the Meditator’s Mindset.
With this mindset, I've let go of any fantasy of one day being perfect forever. I've stopped with the obsession of keeping track of the number of days in a row I made it without my vices (and perpetually having to reset the clock in frustration). I now accept and expect that I will falter a bit, and that sooner or later I will fail. And that it’s OK.
This doesn’t mean I give myself free-license to engage in your vices willy-nilly. Just like there’s that one hard rule in meditation, you'll have your own hard rules you've established as a clear-headed, well-informed, responsible and ambitious adult.
When confronted with the opportunity to deviate, you’re simply not allow, and you have several lines of defenses, like using webblockers/screen-time limits, or using mindfulness techniques to overcome cravings and rationalizations.
But, the game-changer for me was when I adamantly started carrying around the unspoken rule of meditation: to be compassionate with myself when I do the equivalent of losing focus on the breath—which, as a notorious imperfect human, is all but inevitable.
Self-compassion is key in meditation.
Without it, you’d get frustrated at how freaking often your mind wanders to thinking about a stupid work deadline or that time someone dissed you 3 years ago and what would have been a wicked come-back. Then with that frustration, you’d conjure more judgmental ruminations and emotions twisting together like thorny vines, further distracting you from the goal of mental calm and focus.
So self-compassion is not just what you should do to be nice to yourself—in meditation it’s altogether mandatory.
It’s the same for you and your commitment to end your vices.
By all means, set in stone your hard written rules, and it’s beyond wise to remind yourself of them everyday—this is what I do in my morning routine, literally with a printed out list that I read over my coffee—but don’t ever forget that you are human, and that humans evolved to act on instinct and grab at rewards for survival.
It's what we've been doing for a millions years; it's what you'll do tomorrow if not later today.
So just like in meditation, deviations are normal and expected. What's important is what happens after: do you get vexed and disheartened, which leads to more pain and anguish and so a drive for more vice to pacify said pain and anguish... or do you shrug and quickly let it go?
Once you let go of striving for perfection and you “allow” for deviations through self-compassion, a funny thing starts to happen. Your internal desire for your vices will start to lessen.
Remember: we all tend to engage in our vices mostly as a way to cope, relieve or distract away bad feelings, so if you lose the stress and regret of your willpower failings, if you come to expect and shrug-off your inevitable and natural faltering, you’ll lose a lot the inner turmoil and angst that compels you to overindulge in your vices.
Self-compassion is the all-too-often neglected foundation required to end bad habits and start up on new good ones. Once I took on the Meditator’s Mindset, this foundation was instantly built and it keeps getting stronger.
I wish the same for you.
Be well,
- Simon ㋛
BTW 1: This piece is a modified excerpt from… wait for it… my upcoming book 🙂.
Yep, I'm happy to tell you that I just finished the first draft of a book that expands on the ideas of the Habit Reframe Method. It’ll provide a how-to guide on applying the method with a set of 10 rules to follow. It should be out by later this spring.
If you want to put on a waiting list to get updates and to potentially receive a free advanced copy, drop your email in the form at this link.
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BTW 2: I also just posted this piece to r/decidingtobetter. Please🙏, take a second to go there and drop an upvote and or comment. If you found this useful and want others to see it, that would be the best way to make that happen. Thanks for the support!