Introduction
A few years ago I sat down one morning and wrote a poem titled “You are what you repeat.” It came to me in a moment of inspiration and I finished it in one sitting. The truth is it didn’t “just come to me in a flash,” the idea for it had been ruminating for years. I think the poem really explains a lot about why someone has the life that they do.
“You are what you repeat” by Barney Matthews.
You are what you repeat,
I know it is true,
Words that you say,
And deeds that you do.
Words become plans,
Plans become deeds,
This is what determines,
Where your life leads.
Once is a chance,
Twice is a choice,
If you do it again,
Will your future rejoice.
Whether the outcome,
Is victory or defeat,
It's all because,
Of what you repeat.
What it really says is what kind of person you are and what your life is like is caused by what you have repeated. Kind people aren’t just nice to people sometimes, they are nice to people repeatedly. Healthy people don’t just eat a salad once a month, they eat healthy food repeatedly. Successful people didn’t just work hard once, they work hard repeatedly.
Self talk
The first part of “You are what you repeat” is “words become plans.” Or as Earl Nightingale says in his brilliant talk The Strangest Secret - “You become what you think about all of the time.”
The average person has two negative thoughts for every positive one. Our brain was designed this way to protect us from threats a long time ago. The threats may not still exist, but our brains still work the same way. That's a long winded way of saying that you are more likely telling yourself more bad things about yourself than good things.
The more your mind hears something, the more it believes it to be true (that's basically how brainwashing works.) The average person has about 20,000 thoughts a day. That means nearly 7,000 of your thoughts are going to be negative.
If you keep telling yourself "I can't use a use a computer," or "I can't talk in public," or "I can't drive stick shift" - whether or not it is true to start, if you tell yourself it enough times, eventually you will believe it and it will be true. You won’t be computer literate, you won’t be able to give public speeches, you won’t be able to drive stick!
You can “brainwash” yourself to believe good things too though. Sports psychologists do it with top athletes all the time. In fact, Researchers at Waseda University in Japan found that positive self-talk improved physical performance by 11%.
When it comes to good self talk, what the study found worked was:
1. Say it in the third person. For example "Barney handles difficult people well."
2. Say it with confidence. You have to believe what you are saying to yourself.
3. Say what you want. For example "I am a confident public speaker" rather than "I don't stutter when I speak in public."
4. It must be realistic. For example: "I can make a basketball shot" instead of "I will play in the NBA next week."
5. It must be consistent. You must consistently use the positive self talk. Once before a big event isn't enough.
What you tell yourself has a massive effect on what you can and cannot do.
It’s more than that though, what you keep repeating to yourself affects your beliefs too. If you keep telling yourself “all ginger headed people are crazy” or “women can’t park,” even if it’s only a “joke” to begin with, eventually you will truly believe it. You might not admit these beliefs outwardly but your actions will reflect the belief. Ask yourself, “is what I tell myself about other people really true 100% of the time?”
Implementation intentions
The next part of “You are what you repeat” is “plans become deeds.”
Picture this. You wake up on a Saturday morning, open the curtains, see its going to be a lovely sunny day today. You say to yourself “I might go for a walk today.” Fast forward to the end of the day. Guess what you didn’t do today! That’s right, you didn't go for a walk.
There are several reasons you may not have gone for a walk.
You “forgot.” You simply got caught up in the day and forgot about going for a walk until you closed the curtains at the end of the day.
You didn’t seize the opportunity when it arose. You had some free time after lunch when you have gone for a walk but you folded laundry instead.
You had doubts when the opportunity arose. You looked out the window and their was a cloud and decided to stay inside instead.
I’m sure everyone has had this happen to them. The way to overcome this is by using a tool called “implementation intentions.”
Researchers conducted an interesting experiment a few years ago. They asked two groups of students to write an assignment over their Christmas break about what they did on Christmas Eve. The students were asked to turn in the assignment the day after Christmas. One group of students had to specify where and when they planned on writing the assignment. The other group didn’t specify when and where they planned to write their assignment.
What they found was 71% of the students who specified when and where they would work on their assignment turned it on on time. In contrast, only 32% of the students who did not specify when they would work on the assignment turned it in on time. In other words, the students who said in advance when they would work on the assignment were twice as successful.
What the students were doing was declaring “implementation intentions.” An implementation intention is the idea of deciding in advance when and where you will do something. For example “when I finish eating dinner then I will go brush my teeth.” This concept was discovered by a gentleman named Peter Gollwitzer and has been tested and shown to work in over 100 independent studies. In fact these studies have shown that people who declare implementation intentions are between 2 and 3 times more likely to follow through.
This truly is “plans become deeds.” If you decide in the morning that you are going to do something (whether it be go for a walk at lunchtime, count to 10 before you shout at the kids or whatever) then you are 2 or 3 more times likely to actually do it.
Habits
The last part of “You are what you repeat is “deeds.” Deeds that you repeatedly do become habits. At least 40% of what you do every single day is habit and not conscious decision. If you have the habit of snacking on carrot sticks instead of chips you will be healthier If you have the habit of writing a gratitude journal instead of complaining about all the bad things in your life to anyone who will listen you will be happier.
Researchers at MIT have found that every habit has 3 parts - reminder, routine and rewards. The reminder is what triggers you to do the habit. The routine is the set of actions or the habit itself. The reward is the benefit you get from it.
“One page habits” is a simple tool to help people create new habits. Start by getting a sheet of paper and writing this on it:
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WHEN
THEN
PROGRESS
If I miss one day I will do my habit the next day.
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Then pick a habit to build. It is important to work on only one habit at a time. Focusing on one habit at a time increases your chance of success by 70%. Start small with your habit and increase it over time. Make it so small you can’t not do it. It can take several months to form a habit so you have plenty of time to grow it.After that pick a reminder for the habit. The most common reminders are a time, a place, an alarm or existing habit. Consider what could get in the way of doing your habit as you are thinking about the reminder and make a plan to overcome it ahead of time.
Now, fill in the “WHEN… THEN…” statement on the sheet with the reminder (“when”) and the routine (“then.”) This is your implementation intention – as well as your habit. Cool, huh?
Place your One Page Habit sheet somewhere you will see it. Read your “WHEN… THEN…” statement every morning. This is important. This is setting the intention for your “implementation intention” to work. This is what is going to help you actually do your habit every day.
Mentally rehearse the habit in your head at the same time. Visualize yourself doing your habit. Sports Psychologists use mental practice to decrease the time needed to learn a new action. You can use this to help form your habit more quickly too.
Do your habit at your chosen time. Note: don’t skip this step. 🙂
Mark an “X” on the grid each time you do your habit. Tracking your progress on a chart leverages the brains psychological desire for consistency to help you persist until your routine becomes a habit.
Commit to never missing more than one day in a row. Setting an implementation intention a head of time in case you skip a day helps you continue your habit. Missing one day occasionally is OK. Missing two days is dangerous because it often leads to missing three days then four days and before you know it you have stopped completely.
Here is an example of a completed One Page Habit tool.
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WHEN I FINISH EATING MY LUNCHTHEN I WILL GO FOR A BRISK WALK OUTSIDE
PROGRESS
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I’ve found over the years that the excitement for doing a new habit will only lasts for a few days. If you want to keep it up for long enough for it to become an actual habit you need to leverage some tools. This One Page Habit tool combines several proven psychological concepts to help you persist.