In this lesson, we cover some of the more difficult obstacles that derail our habits — being tired, feeling lazy, or feeling stressed or overwhelmed.
- When you just aren’t feeling it — you’ll feel resistance, and a part of you wants to put it off
- You’ll have some kind of mental story or rationalization — I don’t want to do this, you deserve a break, life doesn’t have to be this hard, it’s OK to do it later
- This rationalization is simply a way to deal with the difficult physical feeling that we’re feeling
- Start to bring awareness that it’s happening — what does it feel like, what do you tell yourself, and what do you do
- Notice that we’re compounding the problem — adding guilt and shame and stories about how bad we are, adding to a negative self-image
- Then … you can bring a little spaciousness — it doesn’t have to be a big deal, you can bring some compassion for yourself, give yourself some self-care and relaxation
- Just do that for a little while …
- Then, and only then … see if you can do the smallest bit of the habit when you’re feeling this, working with your resistance a little bit. Scale it down when today is not the day to go hard
- This starts to create the possibility of doing something different in this situation
- And then … if you’d like to do the next stage … see if you can do a little more, giving yourself kindness and breath, but still able to do 5-10 minutes of scaled down version of the habit. No harsh discipline.
- One advanced stage: you can do it even if you’re not feeling it, without harshness, with a relaxed attitude
You can watch the video above, or here on Vimeo.