“Today might be the best chance you have to take action. The longer you wait, the more deeply embedded you get in your current lifestyle. Your habits solidify. Your beliefs harden. You get comfortable. It will never be easy, but it may also never be easier than it is right now.”
James Clear, Blog
Beyond the Quote (229/365)
Your ability to get done what you know you need to get done, even when you don’t want to do get it done, only gets easier (ironically) the more you actually get it done. Did you catch that? In other words, action begets action. Consistent action taken at consistent times for certain tasks formulate habits. And habits make taking action easier. Aligning your life with this truth can help you maximize your efficiency in effort and expedite your path to success.
For, what is the difference between someone who is successful and someone who isn’t? I would argue that the main difference is that the successful person does what they know they need to do even when they don’t want to do it. They have self-discipline to back their vision. The unsuccessful person, however, follows their moods, emotions, and inspirations and does what they know they need to do only when they feel like it. And how often do you really feel like doing what you don’t want to do? My point exactly.
That’s one of the counterintuitive things about success. You have to delay gratification and choose “pain” now for a future pleasure when everything in your instincts tells you to take pleasure now and deal with the “pain” of the future later. What’s more is that it isn’t an equal tradeoff. If it was equal, what would it matter? A pinch now and a cookie later or a cookie now and a pinch later—what’s the big deal? But, the thing about delaying gratification is that the tradeoff between current pain and future pleasure isn’t linear—it’s exponential.
An easy example to understand, one that I think we all can relate to, is how we feel after a healthy meal versus after a cheat meal. Both meals take around the same time to eat—let’s say 10 minutes. While the cheat meal might make you feel pleasure for 10 minutes, it’ll be followed by around 10 hours of pain and regret. A healthy meal might make you feel “pain” for 10 minutes (because you’d much rather have the cake than the salad), but it’ll be followed by around 10 hours of pleasure and feelings of strength. The “pain” of eating the healthy meal gives you a disproportionately longer feeling of pleasure whereas the “pleasure” of eating the cheat meal gives you a disproportionately longer feeling of “pain” thereafter.
The same is true with exercise: how you feel the rest of the day after a one hour workout versus one hour of video gaming. The same is true with money: how you feel when you save 10% of your check versus how you feel when you spend 100% of your check. And the same is true for relationships: how you feel when you spend 30 minutes actively listening versus how you feel when you spend 30 minutes passively ignoring. Your ability to delay gratification and to discipline yourself to act on the option for current “pain” is in direct alignment with your path to future success.
Now that we have that cleared up, it’s time to take inventory. Everything that’s a part of your “routine” is habitualized into your lifestyle. The actions that are a part of your routine are the ones that you’ve done the most consistently and for the longest periods of time. As far as the good habits in your routine? Keep them firmly rooted into your daily grind. As far as the bad habits go? Changing them will never be easy. But, as Clear points out above, they will be easier to change and act on now than they every will be in the future. The more you continue to act on them, the more engrained in your brain and lifestyle they will be.
The good news with this reality, though, is that this rings true with building new habits, too. Action begets action. Consistent action formulates habits. And habits make taking actions easier. Want to be a morning runner? Start. Want to eat more healthy lunches? Do it. Want to have a better relationship with your partner? Listen. And then do it again the next day. And then again on the next. And the longer you keep that streak going, the easier it will be to keep it going. And the same is true for uprooting bad habits. Stop. Or slowly cut back on the number of times you act on the action. And keep cutting back and stopping more and more every day. It’ll get easier. Your habits will solidify. Your beliefs will harden. And you will get more and more comfortable. Good luck.
Read Next: 10 Sobering James Clear Quotes on Making Progress from Atomic Habits
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