For Friends and Family

What are some of the key habits that have been helping me socially?  Habits that improve interactions with friends, family, co-workers, acquaintances, and strangers?

According to The Power of Full Engagement, by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz, we can increase our engagement in life by deliberately creating good habits in four areas of our lives:

1. Social
2. Physical
3. Spiritual
4. Mental

Here are three SOCIAL habits that have been a big part of my life lately.

(1) Phone Home  Call home from work at least once per day to see how my wife is doing.  John Gottman is the world's top researcher on marriage and divorce.  He has shown that after watching a couple argue for just a few minutes on video, he can predict with over 90% confidence whether they will divorce in 10 years.  In his book The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work, he says that the simple habit of checking frequently with your spouse to see what he or she is doing is one of the seven top predictors of a successful marriage.  

(Photo by "Jack O'Lantern" photo by Gone-Walkabout)

(2) When the momma's in the kitchen . . .    Too often in the past, I've viewed my job at home as projects, yard work, and repairing things.  My only role in the kitchen was to clean up after the meal.  There's been a lot more harmony since I started to tell myself, "When the momma's in the kitchen, I'm in the kitchen".  I'm not a cook, but there is so much to do getting ready for a meal that if I'm available feeding the dogs, taking out garbage, cleaning up as cooking progresses, maybe even chopping a few vegetables, whisking, or watching the stove, it makes me realize that dinner doesn't appear by magic and Chris feels more appreciated and supported.


(3) Wander through the hallways . . .    I wrote about this new habit in more detail recently in my post, "Same itch, different scratch"  Whenever I start to lose energy at work, I take a walk around the offices on the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th floors of our office building.  I keep my eyes open for people that I want to talk to who and don't look too busy.  (I wonder how many pick up the phone when they see me coming!)  Sometimes, it's just a chance to catch up with someone I like who I've haven't seen much of lately.  Other times, there is someone who needs my help or who I need to ask for some help or advice.  These walks have helped me break my focus on my own problems and situations, have helped me connect to more people and have more fun, and I'm amazed how much work gets done during these "breaks".

Bribing Myself

Often, what I should be doing is the last thing that I want to do.  Maybe it's just making a phone call.  I know it will be quick and easy, yet I can't bring myself to do it, and I can't even say why.

At times like this, I think I need a bribe.  I need to find a way to reward myself for doing the task.  This is one of the ideas I learned from The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg.  Sometimes I just need to figure out "my currency", what can I give myself in exchange for exercising, for getting through a pile of mail at home, or working in the yard?  What privilege?  What treat?

Same itch, different scratch

How to replace a bad habit with a better habit?  One of the things I learned from the book "The Power of Habit", by Charles Duhigg, is that every habit starts with a cue or a trigger.  Something happens first, and then you respond with the habit.  For example, a dog feels and itch and then responds with a scratch.



Duhigg says that you often can't easily avoid the itch.  The trigger is going to happen, perhaps every day of your life.  What do you do if you tend to respond to that itch with a bad habit?  What can you do about it?  Just decide to stop and then use your willpower every day?


Duhigg recommends that you accept the fact that the itch is going to come, and find a new, healthier way to scratch it.  He sites research showing that people usually can't just stop the behavior with willpower alone.  It is much more effective to recognize the trigger and find a better way to respond to it.  The new habit has to address the itch.  It has to be rewarding, or it may not stick.  But if you can find a rewarding response and can remember to do it often enough to form a strong habit, you won't need willpower to change your ways.


A perfect example in my life happens Monday through Friday at about 10 am.  I'm at work.  I've been pushing myself intensely at work for two hours.  My concentration starts to fade.  I just can't maintain that kind of intensity all morning.  This is my itch.  My old, bad habit was to go to the break room to get yet another tall cup of coffee.  I don't really NEED the coffee.  By this time, I've had plenty of coffee.  If I have another cup, I'll just get jittery.  A short burst of energy is likely to be followed by an even bigger slump, and it's probably not good for my blood pressure.



With Duhigg's book in mind, I decided to accept my itch.  I accepted that I'll always have a mid-morning loss of energy and focus.  And I thought of a better way to respond.  For the last few weeks, I've left my desk and walked around several floors in the office building, stopping to talk to people whenever it feels right.  I've found this rewarding on many levels.  I catch up socially with people I would not otherwise see.  Sometimes I run into people that I need to talk to about work and end up resolving issues quickly.  Other times people ask me for advice, and it feels good to help them.  And even mild exercise like this provides more lasting energy than a cup of coffee.  So the itch gets scratched--I gain energy--and the new habit requires no willpower because I find it rewarding socially, spiritually, and for getting things done at work.

The Robot, the Rat, and the Artist

In my last couple of blogs, I've written about the pervasiveness of habit in my life.  I've written about the need to accept this pervasiveness, to accept my "inner robot" making decisions automatically throughout the day because I always do THIS when THAT happens.  From the moment the alarm clock rings until I go to bed, more decisions than I care to admit are made by my "inner robot".  My "auto-pilot", to a large degree, flies the airplane.

And my habits get their power, their ability to dictate my actions with or without my conscious agreement, from my "inner lab rat", my tendency to behave in whatever way I find most rewarding, my tendency to do whatever I need to do to get my "cheese".

So where does this leave my "inner artist", the being that creates my experience and my accomplishments?  Is it possible for life to be filled with both unconscious habit and conscious creativity?  Can I be a robot, a lab rat, and a human?

I think so.  I think that habits create a framework within which I can be as skillful and spontaneous as I want to be.  Habits get me out of bed.  They feed me, exercise me, give me perspective through meditation, get me to work, and get me to check my e-mails and review my To-Do List.  If they are healthy habits, I end up relaxed, well fed, physically fit, and clear about my priorities and plans when I face each challenge that arises in my day.  And it is when these challenges arise that my inner robot and inner rat step back and allow my inner artist to take over.

Embrace my Inner Lab Rat

I mentioned in my last blog, that I feel cultural pressure to deny my "Inner Robot", to deny the idea that most of the choices I make each day are automatic responses to my alarm clock, to hunger, to arriving at work, to my mid-morning lull, to more hunger at lunch, to my mid-afternoon lull, to everything that happens from after leaving work.

I also feel pressure to deny my "Inner Lab Rat".  I feel pressured to deny the fact that I respond to "cheese". I respond to rewards.  I'd love to think that I'm motivated to do something if it is "the right thing to do".  I wish I was always motivated by logic, that I picked all my actions based on reason and willpower.  But the reality probably is that I do most of what I do because in one way or another I find it rewarding.

The idea that what we choose to do is based mainly on rewards and punishments is the basic premise of "Behaviorism", a theory of psychology developed by B.F. Skinner in the 1930's.  I read several of his books in the 1970's and 1980's when Behaviorism was still in vogue.  According to a recent article by David Freeman in Atlantic magazine, "Behaviorism" fell out of favor for a while because of discomfort with the idea that our choices are based so deeply on rewards versus reason and willpower.  But behaviorism, says Freeman, is now coming back because its principles are the best explanation for the most successful programs aimed at changing behaviors such as Weight Watchers, Alcoholics Anonymous, and certain exercise programs.  Here's a link to Freeman's article:  The Perfected Self.

So, if I accept my "Inner Lab Rat", if I accept that I behave based on rewards more than I do based on willpower and logic, what should I do?  If I want to make a certain choice more often, I guess I'd better figure out how to make it rewarding.  If I want to use the treadmill more, then watch an action movie on DVD or Netflix.  If I want to get through paperwork at home (something I hate doing), then listen to music while doing it.  If I can't make the task inherently rewarding, treat myself afterwards.  Don't just say, "From now on, I'm going to ______ more often" and expect willpower and memory to take it from there.  Figure out how to make the experience so enjoyable that I can reward my "Inner Lab Rat" with some "cheese".  

Embrace my Inner Robot

I recently read The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg.  The book is about research into how people develop habits, how they change them, and how big a role they play in the choices we make from moment to moment.  The book persuaded me that many--if not most--of my choices are driven by habit.  They are automatic responses to recurring triggers.  I respond to the triggers with little thought, like a robot behaving as he was programmed.  But this doesn't have to be bad.  I can embrace my inner robot, as long as I'm aware of my habits and, over time, replace bad habits with good ones.

Duhigg describes research on laboratory rats.  When they are first learning to get through a maze, they expend tremendous mental energy.  When they have repeated the maze so often that they move through it out of habit, their mental activity relaxes greatly.  Their actions become effortless.  This is what I can value about my "inner robot".  Habits allow me to do routine things effortlessly so that I conserve my mental energy for the really challenging, creative tasks.  Also, good physical, social, spiritual, and mental habits can make me happier and healthier.

I feel cultural pressure to deny my "inner robot".  It feels to me that our culture idealizes a life in which we make conscious, thoughtful decisions about everything we do.  It is as if we should always be behaving deliberately and thoughtfully.  Duhigg's book makes a strong case that humans are NOT designed to put a lot of thought into every decision.  We don't need to think about what we will do when the alarm clock rings, when we drive our cars, when we first arrive in the office, when we get ready to leave for the day, etc.

I'm convinced that it's better accept my "inner robot".  Accept the fact that many or most of my decisions will be based on habits--automatic responses to triggers.  Don't expect to change that; to suddenly find ways to make all of my behavior deliberate and willful.  Instead, analyze the habits I have and find ways to improve them.

Layers of Meditation

I love the SleepStream 2 iPhone app.  It's so easy to add layer after layer to the meditation experience:

• The first layer:  a binaural beat.  I talked about binaural beats in my last blog post:  Brainwaves "beat" at a higher frequency when stressed, lower when meditating, lower still when relaxed, and even lower approaching sleep.  Listen to a meditative binaural beat with headphones and your brainwaves measurably change to match the beat.  Meditation becomes easier.
• The second level:  sound effects.  SleepStream offers multiple categories of high definition recordings of waves, wind, fireplaces, rain, forests, white noise, and--one of my favorites--"dry drones", which are space-age electronic sounds.
• The third level:  overlays.  Meditative music such as piano or soft electronic/spacey music or spoken guided meditations.  Huge number of options available for free and more for low-cost download
• The fourth level:   visualizer.  The iPad can cycle through gorgeous photos of Autumn, Spring, Summer, Winter or places like Norway or video of waves crashing on the shore under a huge moon.

I don't always use the visualizer because the other three levels are usually enough to provide a rewarding meditation experience.  But there are times that I listen to one of the many "Waves" soundtracks, go to the "Shamanic Meditation" binaural beat (my fave), put on the "Deepspace Ambient" music, and watch the video of "Midnight Waves".  It is easy for me at these times to pretend that I'm on a real beach, listening to crashing waves, breathing in the ocean air and feeling the power of the waves running through me.