Making Change Feel Familiar
I noticed a feeling when sitting down to write the last two days. It’s something like this:
Ok, the novelty has worn off, but this doesn’t feel easy yet. When can I stop?
The answer is “you can stop when you no longer want to stop.” This feeling was familiar to me from somewhere. It’s me trying to resist change. I have practiced dealing with this exact feeling before. To help you understand, I need to explain why it’s a good idea to come up with bad ideas.
I remember hearing about James Altucher’s technique to become an Idea Machine. I think I heard it on a Tim Ferriss podcast episode, but it’s also on James’ blog. The fact that you can exercise the good idea muscle by simply coming up with a list of bad ideas felt like an insider’s secret to creativity. That meant every idea I came up with made me more creative.
Could I do this with something else? Change is difficult, right? What if I could practice something to indirectly make change feel easier?
One day I noticed that I pick up my shoes together with my right hand and then slip them on in a certain order that’s always the same. I wondered if I could train myself to reverse the order.
It started with me having difficulty even remembering to use my left hand to pick them up first. After a week or two I was remembering to pick them up and proud of that. After the pride wore off I was annoyed with the inefficiency of it as the motion wasn’t smooth. “When can I stop this?” I found myself asking. “When you don’t care about wanting to stop it anymore,” was the answer.
It took another 4-5 weeks before I realized I was doing it all without even thinking about it. Now they both feel natural and I get mixed up on which I’m doing. It’s a weird success, but it IS success!
I’m towards the end of doing this again, but this time I’m putting my jacket on with the left arm first instead of the right like I’ve always done.
I found a familiar thought pattern:
Woops, my jacket is on and I didn’t even think to use the other arm.
Woops, I started putting it on the old way. Let me take it back off and do the new way.
Ah, I’m remembering now. That’s good, but this sure feels awkward.
Ok, I remember all the time. I want to stop. Why do I want to stop? Because it’s not natural yet. Keep going.
It’s becoming natural. It doesn’t bother me as much to do it anymore.
Success. It’s natural. I barely think about it.
I’m somewhere between steps five and six currently regarding putting on my jacket. It’s feeling good. I have confidence that I will be jacket-ambidextrous within another few weeks and then I’ll probably start learning something new.
As for writing, I’m at step 4. It doesn’t feel at all natural yet. It seems silly, but I have these other two examples to point at to know that I can do it. Because I’ve trained myself to switch the order in which I put on my shoes and jacket, I know I can do the same with a daily writing practice.
