The Wonderful Boring Nature of Habits

Here I sit in my favorite coffee shop on a rainy day. It’s coming down in buckets, which is why I am not where I want to be. I want to be at Wonderland riding the Behemoth, one of the most awesome things in existence. But, it’s raining. A little bit of rain would have been okay. I would have toughed that out. But, there’s just no way. Not today.

My friends and I have been planning this trip for weeks. I did not schedule any appointments or meetings today. I also structured my week to ensure that I could get done what I needed to get done in the other four days.

What to do? What to do?

There is something that you need to know about me. I thrive on structure. I plan my work days very carefully, often far in advance. I have a to do list that I follow religiously. I find that this practice usually helps me when the unexpected occurs. If I know what my plan is, I can easily alter it to accommodate a new development. I have a bit more trouble, though, when a WHOLE DAY opens up for me. It’s simultaneously wonderful and scary. When the day started, part of me was like a kid on Christmas morning. But, instead of not knowing what present to open first, I didn’t know what to do first. A bit anxiety provoking.

But, now, as the day moves along, I am calming down and I feel in the groove. Why? Because I followed my routine. I fell back on my habits. I went to the gym, did my bit of the morning housework, started my crossword, got to my coffee shop, and began to write. That description is a good description of most of my work days.

Some of you are probably thinking, “Well, how boring is he? A whole free day and he goes to work and does the same old, same old.” That’s a fair point. I could have done something else. I could have driven to a museum or holed myself up somewhere with a good piece of fiction for the day. Heck, I could have gotten real crazy and gone to a different coffee shop.

Sure, I could have. And maybe I will next time. In fact, I will next time, just so that I can contrast that day with this day (and blog about it).

But, on a rainy day (and I mean it’s really pouring right now), where the huge gap of time caught me unawares, it sure was nice to have my routine, my good ole habits, there for me.

So, habits are both wonderful and boring. In fact, they’re wonderful because they’re just so darn boring most of the time. They keep us on track when we’re feeling lost. And that’s a good thing.

The Guilty by Association Effect (You are Not at the Centre of the Universe)

This is the third in a series of posts on self-thought habits.

Picture it. You and your friend arrive at a party. You introduce your friend, who is from out of town, to the hostess. To your horror, your friend spends the evening getting drunk, making passes at everybody in sight and, as a coup de grace, throws up on the hostess. How will you ever live this down?

Relax. You are not at the center of the universe. You think that you are being judged badly because of your friend’s actions, but you’re not. Or, at worst, you’re not being judged as badly as you think you are.

Jennifer Fortune and I call this the guilty by association effect. In one of my favorite studies, we convinced research participants that their friend had just admitted to cheating in high school. Pronouns can get messy when I write about this research, so I’ll call the person who admitted to the cheating the Offender. The friend of the Offender was the Associate. Associates were told that information about them and the Offender (including the bit about cheating) would be shown to another participant (an Observer). Associates were also told they would be presented as a friend of the Offender. Associates reacted with feelings of embarrassment and they anticipated being judged negatively by Observers. Observers, though, did not care about Associates’ link with Offenders. They didn’t like the Offenders much, of course, but that’s understandable.

But here’s the interesting thing. We could make this powerful effect go away rather easily. We simply had to ask Associates to step outside of their usual perspective. We asked Associates to read the reports about themselves and their friend (the Offender) as if they were an Observer. That was enough to make Associates realize that they would not be judged harshly and it was also enough to quell their feelings of embarrassment!

There are a couple of things to realize here. First, realize that thinking that you’re at the centre of the universe can lead you into some ‘traps’ where you’ll think people think badly of you when, in fact, they don’t. Second, realize that a little bit of perspective-taking can go a long way.

Old Bad Habits and Your Favorite Slippers: It’s Okay to Miss What You Were

It’s okay to miss your old bad habit. It’s funny to say such a thing. After all, you’re improving. You’re getting better. It’s like you’ve got yourself a new pair of slippers. They’re clean with nice colors. The lining hasn’t worn away. They’re not like your old slippers. But, still, you miss those old slippers sometimes. You had them for a long time. Sure, they weren’t as comfortable as they used to be. The dog chewed them and there was a hole in the left big toe, but they were your slippers. It was almost like they were a part of you.

“It’s silly,” you think to yourself, “why should I miss those old things? After all, look at my new ones!” But, still, the new ones don’t feel like you. At least not yet.

It’s the same with replacing your old bad habits for good ones. It’s not only that your old habit worked for you in some way. It did, that’s why you had it. It’s more than that. In some sense, your old habit was part of who you were. Maybe part of being you was indulging in yummy, but fattening, late night snacks. Or, maybe part of being you was always being the one with sarcastic joke. Or, maybe you were always the last one to complete work-assignments. And it’s not only what you thought of you. It’s what others thought of you. You were “snack woman,” or “sarcastic guy.” You might have gained some amount of social identification, some kind of esteem among your peers, with those labels.

Now, you’re changing yourself for the better. Congratulations are in order, of course. But don’t be surprised if you miss your old bad habit. It’s just like missing those old slippers. You need to give yourself time to “break in” that new habit. Don’t worry. In no time it will feel like you’ve had it forever. That’s when it’s time to start work on a new habit!

The Danger of Pushing a Kid in a Swing: A Reflection on the Power of Good Habits

Two somewhat interesting facts about me:


1. For the past few months, I’ve been working out. I’ve been on the elliptical, my mountain bike, and I’ve even gone for a couple of runs. Plus, I’ve been lifting weights. It’s been great.

2. I have children. Fun-loving and incredibly energetic children.

These two facts, in and of themselves, are not particularly remarkable. But the fascinating and intricate ways in which those facts combine to make my life interesting never cease to amaze me. For one, I have to go to the gym extremely early in the morning. For two, I can now keep up with my kids a lot better than I used to. I can run along beside them as they bike. I can lift them above my head with more confidence, and for longer. I can also become overconfident. I can . . .

. . . badly injure my knee by pushing my kid on a swing. (Well, he was asking me to swing him up to the moon.) I was coiled like a spring to give him a hard push and . . .

Whammmo!

Explosion of pain. Me flat on my back trying to figure out how I’m going to walk home.

So, now I am injured. Not severely thank goodness. I’ve seen an expert. Apparently, I’ll be biking around, and even running (!) around, soon. But, I’m tired, mentally and physically. The injury grates on me. It’s the last thing I think of when I ease my poor tired knee into bed and it’s the first thing I think of in the morning as I get a feel for what kind of day it has in store for me. I curse my inability to keep up with my kids. I need to allow extra time to hobble between meetings. I am tempted to wallow in self-pity and eat forbidden food. I am tempted to not lift weights.

This is a trying time.

But, wait!

Good Habits to the Rescue!

I can’t say I haven’t slipped occasionally this past week or so. I’m only human, after all. But, my tendency to resist fatty foods, something I’ve established in the last couple of months, and my tendency to find opportunities to get exercise are really helping me. So, I say, thank goodness for good habits. The true power of habits is how they make our behaviors, good or bad, virtually automatic. At a time when I don’t quite ‘feel like’ doing a lot of things, I rely on my good habits more than ever.

As a side note, this rather minor (and transitory) injury of mine has helped me to understand a little bit, and a little bit only, of the world in which people who are physically challenged live everyday of their lives. I will never look at a person in a wheelchair pushing herself along the street, or an older person venturing out with his walker, in the same way again.