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Here’s an example of a habit I am trying to develop:

Habit of running on a regular basis.

Note, this time my goal is not necessarily to walk/jog/run for 21 or 30 days or so. My goal is to improve my stamina.

I run out of breath even if I have to run for 20 metres, or if I have to climb 20 stairs. So much so that I can not talk and it takes me quite a while to catch my breath.

This was to be a life long habit! As having good stamina helps in a lot of different aspects of life. That’s why it was necessary for me to develop a habit of regularly running first! Once I had developed the habit, then I could go ahead and try to perfect my technique.

Trick is to start slowly! Sooo ridiculously slow that you’d feel silly to skip a day. And do each step every single day! Remember the point is to develop a habit first! That can only really be done by consistency!

Week 1 – wear shoes, dress up, get out the door and then come back in

Week 2 – get dressed and go down the elevator and then come back up

Week 3 – walk 5 mins (could be on the treadmill in the gym in my building, or a walk outside)

Week 4 – walk for 10 mins

Week 5 – walk for 15 mins

Week 6 – walk for 15 mins with 2 30 sec jogs thrown in, so could be walk for 7 mins, jog for 30 secs, walk for another 7 mins, jog for another 30 secs, walk for another 5 mins for a total or 20 mins

Week 7 – walk for 20 mins with 4 30 sec jogs thrown in

Week 8 – walk for 2 mins, jog for 30 sec, then repeat until 20 mins are up

Week 9 – walk for 2 mins, jog for 2 mins, repeat until 20 mins are up

I could not complete week 9 properly due to low carb diet I was trying during the same time. I had incredible lack of energy during that period. So much so that I felt faint on many occasions even after 5 minutes of walking, even though I was eating a lot and drinking a lot of water. I was just careful to limit my carbohydrates.

Anyhow, had to stop mid way for a few days because of my diet experiment (more on that later). Following week I started again but I felt I had lost my rhythm.

I still wanted to build stamina though so started researching different ways of improving it.

Came across High intensity interval training (HIIT). This really appealed to me.

Basically, you jog for a few minutes, then go all out sprinting for 15-30 seconds, then light jog again until heart rate comes down, then sprint again and so on.

Week 9: total time 10 mins; with 2 30 sec 8 mph sprints in between (treadmill) – 2 times a week; with 5+ mins of walking on rest of the days

Week 10: total time 10-15 mins; with 2 30 sec 9.5 mph sprints in between (treadmill) – 2 times a week; with 5+ mins of walking on rest of the days

Week 11: total time 15+ mins; with 3 15 sec 10.5 mph sprints in between (treadmill) – 2 times a week; with 5+ mins of walking on rest of the days

Instead of following a strict regiment of jogging for 2 mins, then sprinting for 30 secs, I just sprint for 15-30 secs then wait for my heart rate to come below 140 then I sprint again, whether that’s with in 2 mins or 4 mins.

I’m finding that it’s hard to really sprint very fast on a treadmill. I feel like I am going to fall down!

So, next session I’ll try HIIT outside!

Over the years I have done many experiments trying find the best way to create new and positive habits and stop bad habits. I have done numerous 30 day experiments and every single one was successfully completed. Some of the habits I kept for up to 2 years. But almost every single one of those habits eventually died down. I went back to my old habits. I just could not understand why that was so.

There has been so much talk about it taking 21 days to establish a new habit! Almost every self help book you read you’ll find something along the same timeline. How it takes 21 days to form a new habit! Unfortunately that never worked for me. And I don’t mean that I tried one habit. I tried to form new habits in many different areas of my life but even doing them for up to 2 years did not work for me, forget about 21 days!

What went wrong? Obviously 21 days worked for some people!

Maybe it was because I was forcing myself to complete my 30 day goals? I did not look at those goals or habits as long term goals. Instead I was determined to complete them for 30 days for the sake of completing them. My goal was to complete those tasks for 30, 60 or pre-determined number of days.

So, for example, my goal was to work out for every single day for 30 days. Instead my goal should have been to look a certain way, or to have more stamina and so on.

My goal was to give up sugar for 30 days instead it should’ve been to have a healthy diet.

Now I’m looking at habits a bit differently. I decide what my ultimate goal is, then I break it down into smaller and more manageable daily tasks.

E.g. one of my goals is to have more stamina. Now this is not a 30 day goal. I want to have more stamina for the rest of my life. I want that to be my lifestyle. So, I’m in no hurry in trying to achieve that. There’s no 30 day goal here. I start with ridiculously small goals for every single day.

One thing you must remember whenever trying to set a new habit is to perform it every single day.

For the first week I only put on my jogging clothes, wear my running shoes and go out the door. Then immediately I come back in. I do this for one week.

For week two, I walked for 5 mins only.

For week three, I walked for 10 mins only and so on…

Best idea is to choose habits for life instead of for short term. If you think about habits in that sense you would realize that there is no rush. Go at a slow pace. Stretch yourself only enough that you don’t mind and you don’t get any resistance from your mind.

So, the first week do something very small. Each week, increase the intensity a little bit. This way before you know it, you would have developed a new habit.

For instance, if you wanted to develop the habit of writing a post for your blog daily.

Week 1. Pick up your computer and log onto your blog and then log off

Week 2. Start writing with a timer and write for only 5 mins, save it as a draft, which you may publish by the end of the week

Week 3. Write for 10 mins daily

Week 4. Write for 15 mins daily

Week 5. Write for 20 mins daily and keep increasing slowly but consistently

Another thing that was missing in all of my 21/60/90 day experiments was the motivation! I had incredible motivation at the beginning but eventually motivation died down and I still kept up my habit because of self discipline.

What if I had tried the following?

Whatever goal I wanted to achieve, I should’ve found sources of motivation for me. That could be watching videos, reading books, reading blog posts, listening to audio tapes regarding that goal, talking to people about it, joining groups about it (offline and online) and so on. Meaning  I should have kept my motivation high.

So, I think habits also die down after a while because we feel pointless in continuing with them. We tend to forget why we really started forming that particular habit. That’s why it’s very important to have a “WHY”. We should be reminding ourselves why we are trying to set a habit, why we’re trying to achieve a particular goal.

E.g. we learn about dangers of sugar. Now we set a goal to cut sugar from our diet. As days go by we tend to slowly forget why we were cutting sugar out of our diets. We have an idea that it’s bad for us but that real intense fear is gone. That motivation is gone! We need to spark that fire again. Otherwise, temptations come in the way! We’re surrounded by wonderful tasting foods that have sugar in them! Not to mention people eating items containing sugar all around us, and let’s not forget the advertising that bombards us on a daily basis!

So, we could start watching videos of dangers of sugar or dangers of high fructose corn syrup. And also, keep yourself busy with reading research documents, visiting blogs about their dangers and so on. Spend some time daily on doing this along with setting small daily tasks of eliminating sugar from our diet. Then see what happens!

Pretty soon you will realize that your mindset has shifted. You will automatically become conditioned to think that sugar is bad for you. And I think that’s the best form of motivation there is. Once you develop a belief then you will not have to force yourself, or discipline yourself to do anything. You will stop having foods that contain sugar or HFCS automatically. You will not even feel like having them

So, the biggest thing I’ve learned from my years of experimenting with trying to set new habits or eliminate bad ones is that we need to keep burning the fire of motivation, we need to keep reminding ourselves why we’re continuing with our 21/30/60 day experiments!

Right now, one of the habits that I’m working on is writing for my blog for 5 minutes daily! Instead of writing and posting, I just write for 5 minutes in google documents then when I feel it’s enough for a post, I just publish it on my blog.

So, do not be surprised if the quality goes down a little bit. I’m trying to write a half decent blog but more importantly setting a habit of writing every single day!

That’s where I find we go wrong! We try to achieve too much too fast! If we do not develop a habit of doing something on a consistent basis, what happens when we’re really feeling down, or tired, or just are not motivated anymore, or something else of importance comes to our life? We take a break! After all it’s just one day!

But before the habit is ingrained in your subconscious mind, no breaks should be taken! None! Even if you spend 2 minutes on your habit, do it! But do not skip a day without performing a task towards your goal!

And make sure you keep your motivation high for the first few weeks especially! 30 day experiments are fine if you consistently keep reminding yourself why you’re involved in this experiment in the first place!

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” – Aristotle

I remember hearing that we should take pride in everything we do.

What if you’re doing something just to pay the bills, should you still do the best job possible?

What if you’re working at a job that you dislike or hate? Should you still put in your best effort there?

What if you don’t get credit for work and in fact credit goes to someone else? Should you still keep on putting your best work?

If you have a job just to pay the bills, is it ok to do your personal stuff while at work? I.e. blogging while at work? Paying your bills while at work? Browse the internet? And so on…

What if the more you do, more is given to you? Should you still keep on doing the best that you possibly can at your job?

Almost all of my life I have had jobs which I disliked but had to do them due to our family’s financial situation. I’ve been working ever since I was 12. Did every single job imaginable!

In the beginning I used to always put in that extra effort above and beyond what was required of me. Later I realized that no one valued my extra work. Not only that but people took credit for my work and in fact made fun of me for working so hard. Also, all of my income went in to the family. Our whole family was like that though. Every one working hard to just make ends meet. Still, I never saw the benefit of working hard since I never got to ever treat myself with my income. As far as I knew, I worked hard for free!

Slowly but surely I started doing the minimum amount of work at jobs which I disliked. Actually I did little more than bare minimum at jobs so I wouldn’t get fired but never gave it my best. I knew I had to work to survive but also realized I did not have to go out of my way to give the job my best.

I always thought I would put in my best effort at a job which I totally loved.

Recently I realized that that’s actually become a habit of mine. No matter what I do I am not able to give it my best. I learned that even if I found something I was loving, sooner or later I slowed down and gave up! I never put in that extra effort that might have taken me over the top! I couldn’t understand why. I was held back because of my bad habits.

That’s when I realized the truth in always giving it your best, no matter what you’re doing! Because that’s how habits form. Once a habit is formed, it’s not that easy to get rid of it especially since it’s been reinforced for more than 20 years.

I’ve noticed one thing at different jobs that I’ve held in the computer industry. I’m sure it’s quite similar in other industries as well. If you do a lot of work you end up setting expectations. If at some time you do a little less work, then you’re questioned as to why you’re slowing down. That’s why you see a lot of people just taking it easy at work. They’re doing a little work when you know they can easily do 5-10 times their usual amount in much less than a full day’s work.

They were not like this to begin with. They got trained to be lazier!

So, I’m not saying start giving it your best at your jobs which you dislike or hate. What I am saying is whatever you do, no matter how little, start doing it the best possible way!

E.g. if you’re working at a fast food restaurant. Don’t try to serve 100 customers when your colleagues are only serving 25! Instead serve the same number as others but serve them well! A little smile here and there, a little politeness, whatever you can do to give it that extra edge!

Now, you’re not doing this for others! You’re doing it for yourself. Soon, you’ll develop the habit to do the best no matter what you’re doing.

And when the time comes and you find your passion, you won’t be slowed down by your bad habits but will be fully ready and prepared for it!

After all, like Aristotle said, excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit!

Malls

When I came to Canada, I don’t remember any malls in India. If there were malls, they were not as common as the malls in Canada. Right now there are a ton of malls there. And they are huuuuuge! Almost every single corner seemed to have a mall now and almost every mall seemed to be 3-5 storeys high!

Prices

If you go to a mall, things seemed very expensive by Indian standards. Even after converting I still didn’t buy much from the malls. As prices seemed same as what I would pay here. Which should make it quite unaffordable for average middle class families in India and yet the malls there were as packed as any mall in Canada that I’ve been to. People were buying things and not just window shopping!

Even after doing the conversion, I still was hesistant to buy much from there as I have often gotten cheaper stuff here. 

That’s not to say everything is expensive in India! There are still a ton of stores and small shops where you can get huuuge bargains! That’s how I ended up bringing back over suitcases that were over the alloted weight!

Money

People there seemed to have a lot of money. And these are the middle class families I’m talking about. And most of them seemed to be keeping up with the latest fashoin. And not just the kids but their parents as well!

I was looking for things that would last me a few years because of their prices. Meanwhile my cousins there were happy if things lasted for the next six months, shoes for example.

Actually, shoes there were quite nice. They had a huuuge selection and a lot of the affordable shoes were also very very light. Here, lighter the shoe, more expensive it is. Around the Taj Mahal, they were also selling shoes made of camel skin, very light and very durable!

I also found that there was a lot of opportunity to make money in India. While I was there I found at least 3 different ways to make a ton of money with in a short period of time!

Traffic

The absolute biggest difference between Canada and India was the traffic! Not only are there a lot more cars on the road but they’re sharing the road with people on bicycles, on motorbikes, on scooters, in rickshaws (driven like bicycles using peddles), rickshaws (motorized, like motorcycles), sometimes even cows, buffaloes, ocassionally some goats and sheep, pedestrians, buses, trucks, tractors and so on. This is just what comes to my mind right now.

Mind you, on highways you are not likely to find any animals but traffic is still a huuuuuuge problem.

All the roads are perfectly marked with lanes but you soon realize that they’re just there for show. If there is room on the road, someone will fill it up, someone will squeeze in there. On a normal 3 lane road, there are at least 5 cars standing side by side with maybe a few scooters or motorcycles filling the space in between the cars!

I have never in my life seen horns used as much as I did in a few days in India! That’s practically the only way to let people know in the front that you’re coming behind them.

People there have their own rules. If you honk your horn, majority of the time people in front will let you pass. There’s barely 2-3 feet of space in between cars front and back!

I thought it was not a big deal since traffic speed was barely 20 km/h but even when we got on the highway with speeds easily approaching or exceeding 100km/h, people were still driving in the same way! Their reflexes were amazing! I did not even witness one major accident even with people driving like this.

Imagine driving at 100km/h with only 3 feet of space between you and the car in front and then barely 3-4 feet between you and cars around you! But people drive like that! They swerve in and out of lanes with ease!

Majority of the cars there are smaller cars though with manual transmissions. A Honda Civic is considered a large car there. But I saw every single type of car there, from cheapest to the most expensive models!

You are not allowed to talk on cell phones while driving, nor are you allowed to drive without a seat belt as you do get ticketed/fined! And people seemed to obey these rules!

A few of my relatives were really amazing drivers. They would eat, talk on phone, take notes, drive a manual car, and still at high speeds while merging in and out of different lanes! And they looked quite normal, just like you and me! Wolves in sheep clothing I tell you!!

Once I took a bus and even that was swerving through traffic same way a much smaller car would. On my left was a truck full of people going for some parade. There was about 1 foot of distance between these two. At one point the bus I was in hit the truck so they got stuck side to side. Now on the road we were being driven like that. A bus stuck to the truck! Finally, they got unstuck,and the truck driver swore loudly for a few minutes at the bus driver and left, still being driven at a decent speed! If that was here, we would have police, ambulance, fire trucks and it would stop all traffic for a long time!

I see here people getting upset if knicked by another car’s doors in the parking lot and in India you can’t find a car without any knicks or dents!

Many times I saw the husband driving a scooter, a kid standing in front (space between front seat and handle), kid sitting behind him, wife sitting behind the kid (old fashioned way with both legs on one side) and another kid in her lap! Crazy and dangerous!

Mind you a lot of people on scooters and motorcycles are killed each year due to accidents! I myself have lost a lot of relatives because of a truck and a scooter accident!

I was riding on a motorcycle or a scooter a lot of times as well and that was scary! A lot of streets are extremely narrow, barely 10 feet and people sometimes squeeze their cars in there as well! Imagine you’re on a scooter and a car is approaching you from the other side and you can’t pass each other, so you stop and pull your scooter to the extreme left, leaning against the wall of the house and the car thus passes, only then you proceed!

I would have loved to drive in India as I could drive without the fear of getting caught for swerving through traffic! But I didn’t want to take a chance of wrecking someone else’s car.

Remember steering wheels are on the right side in the vehicles and people drive on the left side of the road, totally opposite to the way we drive here in Canada.

But even with all this crazyness I was never afraid in any vehicle and actually quite enjoyed my rides!

Then I came back here to Canada, my dad picked me up in an old Toyota Camry. I felt like I was in a luxury car! Soooo roomy and soooo quiet! No one honking any horns and everyone following the lane markings on the road! For a while it was totally incomprehensible! I couldn’t believe the difference!

But when all is said and done, I was glad to be back on Canadian roads!