Latest / She Resets: Mindset, Fitness, Confidence / Ep 16: Why you keep doing things you don't actually want to do.

Transcript

Ep 16: Why you keep doing things you don't actually want to do. · She Resets: Mindset, Fitness, Confidence

• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to week six of our mini series.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: So do excuse me, I have put off recording this as long as possible because I have had a bit of a cold and a sore throat and a cough, and but I can't put it off any longer because it needs recording because it needs to go out in two days, and I have no time tomorrow.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: So do excuse me if I have to clear my throat or have a little cough.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: I do have a drink at the side of me.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure you've all been there.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, this is week six of the mini-series, halfway point.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: So I want you to really think about the goals that you set five weeks ago and think about how well on you are with them.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Are you making progress?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Are you nowhere near?
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Do you need to re-evaluate?
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: Do you need to change your goalposts?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: Because you absolutely can.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: So in the last six weeks, we have looked at setting those goals, we've looked at choosing progress over perfection, we've looked at stopping the overwhelmed overthinking over it kind of thought process.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: We have talked about dealing with setbacks, and we've looked at finding that deeper motivation and the why behind the what.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: So this week we're going to go a little bit more practical.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to look at why you maybe keep doing the things that you don't even want to do.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's something really important if you're trying to make changes in your life.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: But how do we actually make changes stick?
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's one thing to know what you should be doing.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: We all know what we should be doing, but it's another thing entirely to actually do it consistently.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to start with something that I really want you to remember.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: And that is that discipline is a muscle, it's not a personality trait.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can train it.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: You are not either a disciplined person or an undisciplined person.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: And you're certainly not stuck and you're not destined to spend your whole life doing the same things you've always done.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: The goal isn't to spend the rest of your life having to force yourself to make good decisions.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: The goal is to get to the point where some of those behaviours become almost automatic, where you don't have to have that fight with yourself every single time, those two voices in your head both disagreeing and pulling you in different directions.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because let's be honest, it'd be nice, wouldn't it?
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Be nice to make some habits that are good habits rather than bad habits.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Because nine times out of ten, when we talk about habits, we talk about bad habits.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's a bad habit of mine.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I shouldn't do that, it's a bad habit.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: We never say, Oh, well done me for doing a good habit.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about habits.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: Excuse me.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: So, why do we do things automatically?
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Think about something really simple, something that you do all the time, and that is picking up your phone.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, my phone might as well be surgically attached to me.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: It might be that you're waiting for the kettle to boil.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you've got five minutes before you need to leave the house.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're bored.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're avoiding doing something that you just really don't want to do.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: And before you know it, you've opened Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, you've checked your emails for the third time in ten minutes.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: You might not have consciously decided, right?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm bored.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm now going to spend the next 25 minutes scrolling.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: It just happened.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: And that's a habit.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: How many hours of your life have you lost to doom scrolling?
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you can't see me, but I am putting my hand up and I'm saying hours.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: Flipping hours.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a habit.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: Habits are basically shortcuts.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: So your brain loves a shortcut because shortcuts save energy.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: They're economical.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: And if you've done something repeatedly in response to a particular situation, your brain starts to recognise the pattern, and your brain goes, Oh, I know this one.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: I know what we do now.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: We don't need to think about this anymore.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: So we pick up our phone and it becomes an auto habit, an autopilot.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that's incredibly useful in many situations.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: So imagine if you had to consciously think through every single thing you do during the day.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: You have to think about how to brush your teeth.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_00: You have to think about how to make a cup of tea, how to drive your car, how to put your shoes on and tie your laces, how to open a door.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: If you had to think about all of these things consciously, your brain would be absolutely shattered by lunchtime.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: So instead it creates automatic patterns.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: But here's the problem: your brain does not care whether the habit is helpful or unhelpful.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: It just cares when it's familiar.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: So most habits have three parts.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: They have a trigger.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: So a trigger is something that starts the process.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Then they have the behaviour.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: So that is what you actually then go on to do.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then they have the reward, which is what you get from doing it.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: So if we use scrolling as an example, your trigger might be boredom, might be feeling overwhelmed, might be sitting down after work and having a few minutes, or getting into bed.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: The behaviour is then picking up your phone and starting scrolling.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: And the reward?
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's probably stimulation or distraction or just mind-numbing.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Might be just a relief that you don't have to think about whatever's bothering you or on your mind or what you've got to do next or tomorrow.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And because your brain gets that little reward, that little dopamine hit, your brain learns, oh, that's worked.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: Let's do that again next time.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the next time you're bored, you pick up your phone.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Next time you're stressed, you pick up your phone.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: The next time you're avoiding something, you pick up your phone.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I can't see you, but I bet a lot of you are nodding.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: I bet you're thinking, yeah, she's right, I do.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: And eventually it gets to the stage where you might not even notice you're doing it.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: And that's when you've really, really installed an autopilot.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just a case of willpower, isn't it?
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: Just willpower, I've just got to not do it.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: But actually, willpower isn't enough.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: And this is quite important.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: If you've ever thought to yourself, I just need to be more disciplined.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: Or why can't I just make myself do it?
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: Or what's wrong with me?
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing's wrong with you.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: You're trying to override an established pattern, an established autopilot, using willpower.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: And willpower isn't endless.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's like holding your breath underwater.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: You can only do it for so long before you need to come up for air.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's like your mobile phone.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Speaking of phones, it only has a battery that lasts so long.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: If you never charge it, it will never keep working.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: Does that make sense?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: Does it say the right way around?
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: You have to keep charging it to keep it working.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's the same with willpower, it's just it runs out like your phone's battery or your breath.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's not endless.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: So think about how different you feel when you've had a really good night's sleep.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: You've got plenty of time, you're feeling positive, everything's going well.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: And on the flip side, compare it when with when you're tired, you're stressed, you're rushing around, you've got 10 billion things on your to-do list, and someone's just asked you where their school tie is.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: And your capacity to make conscious choices is different.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: And that's when these autopilots take over because they're shortcuts, they don't require the energy.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: So let's stop thinking about fighting your habits with willpower and start thinking about how you can reinstall them.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: And this is the exciting bit, this is the fun bit, this is the bit I love.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: And if you do this or if you recognise something, get in touch with me, I'd love to hear.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: So, what habits are helping you, and what habits are hurting you?
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: Have a little think about your own life.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Not the big things, just the small things.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: And ask yourself, what habits are helping me right now?
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: So it might be that you always fill your water bottle before leaving the house.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: I do every morning.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: That's one thing I do now.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: I fill my juice bottle.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: Don't drink water, hate water.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, although I have a client in Bisbum, and her water is really nice.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: And when I go there, I have about two glasses, big glasses.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_00: She makes me.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: But at home, ugh, I don't like my water in Carlton.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I have juice and I fill my bottle at the start of the day, and by the end of the day, it's finished.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it takes me all day and I'm drinking it with my tea.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's gone by lunchtime.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: But the important thing is that it's a good habit.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: They do it every morning.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: It might be that you go for a walk after dinner in an evening or at lunchtime at work.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: Or it might be that you lay your gym clothes out the night before, so you're giving yourself no excuses.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you spend the first five minutes of each day planning the rest of your day.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: And these are all really great habits, and probably a lot of them now are natural autopilot habits.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: But then thinking about the other side of the coin.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: So, what habits do you have that might be making life a little bit harder?
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: So it might be automatically reaching for your phone whenever you're bored.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: Or it might be that you snooze your alarm five times.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: I snooze my alarm twice, and I set it early enough so that I can snooze it twice, which is ridiculous, and it is something I'm working on.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: Or it might be that you put off difficult tasks until they become deadline urgent.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: Or you tell yourself you'll just check one email, but then you end up scrolling because it's so easy to come out of your emails and click on Facebook or Instagram.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe whenever you're feeling overwhelmed or stressed, you avoid the thing you're feeling overwhelmed or stressed about, rather than swallowing the frog and dealing with it.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: But it's important to notice something, and that is that awareness comes first.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: You can't change anything until you're aware of it.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: You can't do something about something you don't know about.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: So you can't change a habit that you haven't noticed.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: So you've got to start noticing these things.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Knowledge is power.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: There you go.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: There's one of my big catchphrases.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: Been saying it for nearly 20 years now.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: Knowledge is power.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: Once you know something, you've got the power to do something about it.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: So don't judge yourself.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: When you spot something, don't be hard on yourself.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Because then we're going into negative language, negative self-talk.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: Being ourselves up, that's not the idea.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually to be curious, be fascinated, notice something, and then be proud of yourself for noticing it, and then get excited because you can do something about it.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: So instead of, oh, why am I so lazy?
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: Try, huh, that's interesting.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: When does this usually happen?
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: When do I usually feel a little lazy?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: What's led up to it?
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: What can I learn from it?
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself much more useful questions.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: So once you've raised the awareness, once you've spotted some bits and bats that you think, oh, they're not helpful habits, we're not going to call them bad.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to call them unhelpful.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: Then you can actually break, start to think about breaking them.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: So what we talked about before with your trigger, your behavior, and your reward, we call that a trigger loop.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Simply because it loops around.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: Trigger, behavior, reward.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: It comes full circle.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: And you can actually break that loop with what we call a pattern interrupt.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: So we can actually do something about these automatic behaviors, which is brilliant.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: This is where we get proactive.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Everything's going wrong.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's gone, it's gone.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: I do apologize.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so let's talk about a pattern interrupt.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: Exciting.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: And it's exactly what it sounds like.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: You interrupt the pattern before it gets to the automatic behaviour.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: So let's say your habit is scrolling when you sit down on the sofa.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: So you sofa, you pick up your phone, you scroll.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: Obviously, you don't sofa, you sit on the sofa.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, gosh, I've interrupted my flow and now I'm all of a dither.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: So you sit on the sofa and you pick up your phone, you scroll.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: You don't even think about it.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: So you've got to introduce something else into that process.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe you sit down, you notice your hand reaching for your phone.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: And instead of automatically opening up your favourite social media app, you put the phone down.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: You stand up, take a deep breath.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: You might walk into the kitchen, make a cup of tea.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: You might grab a book, you might put some music on.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: What you do isn't the important bit, the behaviour.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: That's not the important bit.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: The important thing is that you've broken the automatic sequence.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: So you've created a moment where the power is yours.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: You get to choose what happens next.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: And that's really powerful because you're moving from this is just what I do to hang on a minute.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: I actually only get to decide what I do next.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: Or if we use another example, you might be that word, procrastinating.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: You've got something you really need to do.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know it won't take that long.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: You sit down at the computer, but suddenly you need to check your emails.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's really important than doing the job you don't want to do.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: Then you need to make a coffee.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: Then you need to Google something.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: I've even been known to go and fold the washing to put off something I don't want to do.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: And then you're back to scrolling, and before you know it, you're watching some video about a woman renovating a cottage in Cornwall.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: I do do that.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: And you're thinking, how did I get here?
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: So we've all done it, but let's now identify the trigger loop.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: So the trigger is, I've got to do something I don't really want to do.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: The behaviour is I'll find something else to do instead.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: And the reward is, well, I get temporary relief from the thing I'm avoiding doing.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: So don't just expect yourself to become like a total machine overnight, ploughing through all your to-do lists, willy-nilly.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Just start to think about interrupting the pattern.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: So when you notice yourself starting to do something else instead of the task at hand, stop, take a breath, and say to yourself, I'm procrastinating.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's it.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's all you need to do.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: You've just created awareness.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: You've just made yourself stop and think, you've just taken a beat.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: And then give yourself an alternative.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: Think to yourself, right, I'll just work on it for five minutes.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: Not for an hour, not till it's finished, I'll just do five minutes.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because five minutes is better than no minutes.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we're not trying to become a different person overnight.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: You can't.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: And much as we all want results, like by yesterday lunchtime, that just doesn't happen.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: But what we're doing is starting to teach our brain a new response.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: But as with all habits, you've got to keep doing it for it to become a habit.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: Remember, your unconscious mind loves repetition.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: You've got to repeat it enough times for your brain to go, ah, this is a shortcut, and then start to do it automatically.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then we can go a step further, and we can create some new habits with habit stacking, which is ace.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: So we can talk about building the behaviours we actually want.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: So one of my favourite things to do is to habit stack, and it is incredibly simple.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: So you take something that you already do automatically, and then you attach a new behavior to it.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: So instead of trying to remember to do something new, you use an existing habit as the trigger.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: So for example, while the kettle's boiling in the morning, I'm going to take a few deep breaths, set myself up for the day, regulate my nervous system.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Or as I brush my teeth, I'm going to do some calf raises.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: I have really tight calves, and if I don't stretch them enough, it affects my running.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: So when I'm brushing my teeth morning and night, I'll stand at the sink, and as I brush my teeth, I'll do calf raises to stretch them out.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: Or when I sit down at my desk, I'll spend two minutes planning my priorities.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe after I've put the kettle on, I'm going to do 10 squats.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: Or, and I love this one.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: When I get home, I'm going to have my trainers by the front door, and I'm not even going to shut the door behind me.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just going to put my trainers on, go for a walk.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: And these are all really small things, but they've got to be small things.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because we do have a tendency to think that change has to be massive and it has to be immediate.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: Repetition is what we're after.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: So that is my sermon for today.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you find it interesting.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: I would really, really encourage you to think about one habit, just one habit that you can start to interrupt.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: Just one thing that you can do this week that by next week, when you come back to this podcast, you can think, oh, nailed it.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: I've done it.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm on my way to making that new autopilot.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because then you get to celebrate, then you get to be proud of yourself.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: You be positive.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what this is all about.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you very much.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: Do share with me anything that's going well.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do share with me any help that you need.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll be back next week for week seven.