Force of H.A.B.I.T

By Ahsan

We are the sum total of our habits. All of our good habits, render good results. All of our bad habits, inhibit results. Habits make us and habits break us. Think deeply for a moment and see if this is true in your life.

What is H.A.B.I.T ?

A helpful acronym for HABIT is: Holistic Actions Building Incredible Traction

Traction towards what, you ask? Traction towards your goals. When we want to achieve our goals, we need to have habits that help build sustained traction. When considering your goals, start building a list of habits that are needed to support the achievement of your goals. For example, if we want to be on time for appointments, we might make it a habit to be ten minutes early. Likewise, if we want to build a strong and muscular body, we probably should make the habit of thinking of a muscular image of our body and exercise regularly. Habits are always actions that we take either mentally or physically. These actions (read habits) drive us toward our goals.

The challenge is making habits stick, isn’t it? If we do some thinking and list out the habits we need to reach our goals, we will find that some days we will do them and other days we will forget to do them. Intentions alone do not make a habit automatic. The habits that stick need more than just alarms and reminders. We will be better off, if we can make the habit a part of a routine. For example, if your goal is to work out when you come home from work, what is your usual routine? Do you change into something more comfortable? Do you flop down in front of the T.V? Do you raid the fridge? Do these habits support your goals?

In other words, build goal-driven habits into a routine and see your goals being achieved. Make exercising a routine by having structures in place. That structure could be exercising five days a week except for Saturday and Sunday, 30 minutes after arriving home, after changing into your work out clothes.

Just be sure to build one habit at a time. If you are a normal human being, there are probably 37 habits you want to change. Realistic achievement of changing 37 habits starting tomorrow all at once will guarantee failure. Instead, identify one habit and work on it for two weeks. At the end of two weeks, start working on the second habit on your list and so on. Over time, you will see more of your habits becoming natural and ingrained, especially when they are part of your routine.

This approach is holistic because these actions are being implemented so as to build rare and incredible results in your life that have traction and magnetize your goals into reality.

Action Steps:

1. List a goal you want to achieve in the next three months.

2. List the step by step plan (structure and routines) to achieve it.

3. Figure out the key habits that will magnetize the goal into reality.

Learn New Things

By Shazad

Why bother learning new things? Why not just be done with education once you graduate from
College or University? Knowledge and Skills are like tools in our toolbox. If the only thing we
had in our toolbox was a hammer – we could only drive some nails into some wood. If we add
some screw drivers, a clamp, a wrench or two and a power drill, we can accomplish much more.
Consider learning new things like a new language, business skills or computer programming just
like adding new tools. With each skill come new opportunities to see the world around us.
Each of these tools helps us gives us potentially new ways to address problems we face so that
we are not simply trying to drive nails into wood over and over again.
Whenever you feel stuck in a loop or a dead end, ask yourself if what you need is a new way to
understand the issue. What could you resolve if you added some more knowledge to your
current pool of knowledge? What new skill would help you see an opportunity that you are
missing today? Keep adding to your toolbox each and every year so you can live a fuller life.

Creating A Personalized Healthy Self-Image

By Shazad

It is a New Year and new beginning.  Many people will commit to becoming healthier and more specifically, leaner.  That commitment is part one of the process but what is part 2 that helps us stay lean and healthy?
Part one is like being on a road trip to see your cousin in the USA. You just keep driving. You don't stop for long site seeing in between. You get the job done. This part is about doing the exercise and eating the right amount of real food. This is not about being balanced and its not supposed to be fun. Suck it up and be regimented.

Part two is about not reverting back to old habits and patterns. What is the minimum amount of exercise that will do everyday? What is the minimum amount of good food that will your body needs? Life throws challenges but our self image has to be that of a fit person who eats good food and works out. This self-image is key to transforming yourself and becoming that better person. If you think of yourself as aging, short, fat, slow or other negative way,  you will remain that way.  If you do happen to change to a leaner version of yourself, you may snap back to your past life just like an elastic band returns to its original shape. This is why changing your mental image is fundamental to creating a new you. If you believe there is an incredibly healthy, strong, smart and ageless person within you, you establish that as your new baseline.  Your mind must constantly see your best self as your natural state and everything you do as the process towards that state of mind and body. Work on your personality every day to make the body manifest what is in your mind.  For example, if I have Daniel Craig fit body (see Skyfall movie) for myself in my mind's eye in Ultra HD clarity, I can make a rich identity in my mind.  I can then strive to achieve that very specific physical result through  fitness and diet programs...minus the special gadgets and dangerous stunts.  This new physical self-image that I created for myself is very specific and detailed outcome which can help me achieve a very real result.  Each one of us needs a specific self-image that matches us in a realistic way.  This is the way we can stick to our commitments once we make a pledge to transform to the best version of ourselves. The New Year is a great time for reflection and reinvention. So, what's your new self-image going to be this year?