“Self-reflection has turned out to be one of my most powerful tools in changing my life. It becomes a mirror that helps you see what’s going on in your life, that keeps you from making the same mistakes over and over again, from being on autopilot and failing to course-correct. Having a blog with readers is like having a journal on steroids—it forces you to reflect on what you’re doing in your life, because if you’re going to share what you’re learning with other people, you first have to reflect on what you’ve learned.”
Leo Babauta, Essential Zen Habits (Page 50)
Beyond the Quote (37/365)
Creating space for self-reflective thinking is crucial for self-improvement. If you want to live your best life, you have to take time on a regular basis to take a good look at where you are, where you are going, what has happened, what those “happenings” mean, and what needs to be adjusted so that you can keep moving forward.
What happens to a lot of us is that we get caught in the daily trap of “too busy” and we forget to or feel like we don’t have any time to self-reflect. But the reality is, we all spend time every day doing stupid stuff. You know it and I know it. And that time could easily be budgeted towards accomplishing something of crucial importance, like self-reflection.
Why is self-reflection of such “crucial” importance? As Babauta mentions above, self-reflection is the way we course-correct the direction of our lives. Autopilot is great but without course-correction, autopilot can take passengers wildly off course. Even a one degree shift in a plane’s flight path can lead the plane to a completely different territory.
Cruise control is great, but even a one degree tilt of your car’s steering wheel in the wrong direction and you could risk crashing. Mindlessly going about your days can have a similar effect on your life where you end up in completely unexpected places or even end up “crashing” in drastic ways—without even realizing it happened as a result of your uncorrected course of actions. This is where the power of course-correction through self-reflection comes into play.
Self-reflection doesn’t have to be an elaborate process. It can happen in the span of a few minutes of quiet, meditative style thinking. When we think with the purpose of understanding the “happenings” of the day we can evaluate our decisions and actions, look more closely at the meanings behind the decisions and actions of others, and we can run simulations in our head that might help us best decide how to move forward. Without those simulations, the first response that comes to mind tends to be the one we rashly spit out and might later regret.
Self-reflection can also happen within the pages of a private journal or notebook. You can answer questions like, “What went well today?” “What could have went better?” “What did I learn today?” “What do I need to spend more time on tomorrow?” “Am I on track to accomplishing my goals?” “How might I prioritize my time and energy tomorrow to get more done?” “What/Who am I grateful for?” “Who might I speak to that will help me stay on track?” etc.
Or you can, of course, choose to have a “journal on steroids”—a blog. You can reflect on your experiences, sort through what they mean to you, offer some insight and perspective, and publish it for the people in your circle to see (kind of like what this “Beyond the Quote” challenge has become for me). This adds a level of accountability, but isn’t necessarily better than the other two.
The most important thing is that you’re creating the space for the thinking. Do it. Because while every day might look and feel the same, one day you’ll wake up and look back and everything will be different. And the scariest thing is when life happens and you never even took a minute to process the “happenings.” One degree is hard to detect, but a deliberate one degree adjustment can be extraordinarily impactful. Take control of your one degree shifts and steer your life forward in the direction of your choosing.
Read Next: 16 Leo Babauta Quotes from Essential Zen Habits and How To Master the Art of Change
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