It’s a terrible feeling.
You see all these people making things happen, so why is it so damn hard for you to just go for that jog in the morning?
You want to. You know you’ll have more energy and be more creative, and it’ll feel good to fit into your favourite jeans again. But you aren’t doing it.
And exercise isn’t even your biggest problem.
You have big dreams and plans for yourself but, for some reason, you don’t follow through. You watch the rerun of Breaking Bad when you know you should be brainstorming for your business or working on your website or writing that book you’ve always dreamed of publishing.
It’s frustrating as hell, because you do want these things for yourself. And you aren’t entirely sure why you aren’t doing them.
It’s not because you’re lazy and it’s not because “you’re just not good at that”.
It’s mainly because you’ve fallen out of the habit of doing new things.
Self Discipline = Self Trust
A lot of people don’t know this, but the foundation of self discipline is actually self trust. So, if you want to build self discipline, you’re going to have to build self trust. How do you do that? By repetitively following through on the things you say you’re going to do for yourself and tracking it in some way. (BTW: it’s easy to follow through on stuff for others—what we’re working on here is you doing stuff that matters to you.)
I want to share a little practice I created for myself that has worked small miracles in my life.
Okay, so here’s how it works.
The 7-Day Self-Trust Challenge
You Need:
- A small notebook
- A pen
- A strong desire to do something that matters to you
Now Follow These Six Steps
1. At the top of the first page of your notebook I want you to write:
My Goal: To build self trust by following through on the things I say I’m going to do. (This is VERY important. Your goal cannot be to lost weight or finish your website. Your goal is to build self trust by doing those other things. This little shift in perception makes it much easier to follow through.)
2. After that write:
My First Challenge: (Choose something simple but valuable for you that you will need to do every day for 7 days. For my first challenge I actually chose two, because they went together – wake up at 8 am, and exercise for 30 minutes doing anything I want as long as there’s some cardio—yoga, cycling, swimming etc. And, yes, I know 8 am sounds late. Don’t judge. I had fallen into a bad habit of working till 4 am.)
My Reward: (Choose something small you really want to have or do. For me it was to eat out at a restaurant I’d been wanting to try.)
3. Next, create a one-week calendar grid, so you can check off each day that you successfully complete your challenge. Be sure to actually check it off. This small action is part of practicing “follow through.”
4. At the end of each day, write down your reflections on how it went and what kinds of resistance you faced (if you read my previous posts, then you know your “False Self” will be doing everything it can to stop you from doing something new. You need to track what kinds of things it says to you to try to stop you. Awareness is power).
5. Do a retrospective: At the end of the 7 days, write (in your notebook) about what worked and what didn’t. How do you feel after your first week? Were you able to meet the challenge? If not, what new strategies can you use to help you do better next week? Also, are you still happy with your challenge or do you want to change it to reflect your experience? (After my retrospective, I changed mine so that I could get up at 10 am on weekends. Eventually, I also changed it so that the 7th day—Sunday—was a “free day” where I could choose to follow it or not.)
6. Create another 7-Day Self Trust Challenge, building on whatever you learned from your first one. Trust me when I say it gets easier, and you’ll get better at it. Remember, in this game you make all the rules and it’s all based on areas where you want to build trust in yourself. And building trust is a process, so it’s okay if you screw up and miss a day, just remember to write down what the thoughts/experiences were that caused you to do that and how you can better deal with it next time.
My Personal Results
By following this exercise, I’ve gone from being mostly stagnant to riding my bicycle (which sat in storage for 4 years) for a couple hours at a time. I’ve also gotten much better at following through on doing work on my business. But the most valuable thing is that just doing this little exercise gives me a feeling of accomplishment every single day. And when you feel good about yourself you tend to get a lot more shit done.
Every one of us has the ability to do what we really want; we just need to create systems and practices that support us while we’re doing it. When I worked as a business journalist I met hundreds of successful entrepreneurs, and every last one of them had put great systems in place to support them (and many of them had coaches as well, to keep them motivated).
If you try this out, I’d love to hear about your experiences in the comments below. Also, please share any exercises you’ve tried for building self trust.
