#136 Unoriginal thought

You build self-trust by taking actions – Tiny Trust Builders – in alignment with who you want to be.

I want to be a writer, and build self-trust by writing every day, even if it’s just one line.

I want to learn Portuguese, and build self-trust by practicing every day, even if it’s just 2 minutes.

But often, what stops you from taking these actions in the first place is a lack of trust in yourself.

I don’t trust myself to write every day – I’ll give up anyway.

I don’t trust myself to learn Portuguese every day – I’ll probably get busy and skip a day.

There’s only one way out of this vicious cycle:

When you don’t trust yourself to take the actions, you take a leap of faith instead.

Because with every leap, fear turns into faith, and faith into trust.

Trust you must.

The trick to successful habit-building: make daily practice easy.

We often do the opposite: we make weekly practice hard.

If I tell myself I’m going to post one long blog post every week, I’ll find a million reasons not to write for the first six days until I have no choice but to write.

But if I tell myself I will post daily, the longest I can procrastinate is… 12 hours?

And after a week, I’ve practiced my publishing habit 7 times.

So it goes for meditation, yoga, running, and any skill or habit.

Make the daily practice easy.

You won’t feel that you’re getting addicted to social media when you scroll through feeds on your smartphone every day. But you are.

You also won’t feel that you’re becoming a writer when you write just 1 minute a day. But you are.

You’re always on track to doing something or becoming someone. But rarely will it feel that way in the day to day.

Choose wisely.