What’s On My Mind Weekly 2021 — March 22- March 28
Hey everyone! Long time no see, or at least for me, it feels that way. Over the past week, I’ve limited my social media use to 30-minutes or less every day, and I’ve been feeling much clearer with my head. Urges here and there to still check what’s happening (which is why I don’t abstain completely), but I’ve realized that a lot of my scrolling hasn’t really amounted to much. If you’ve been feeling similar things with social media, or just want a change with what you could do, I’d highly recommend it!
On a related note, if you’ve been trying to reach out to me and I haven’t responded, that’s why! Feel free to reach me via text! One person told me it’s such an old way of communicating but it gets the job done.
Anywho, let me share what’s been on my mind 🤓
Identity
Believe me, as I was going to do my first social media limit, I was telling myself “Surely, I can’t keep this up. Social media’s a pretty big thing for me!”
Yet here I am, nearly 7 days having done it, which got me reflecting. How was it that I was able to do this seemingly drastic change versus any of the other things I set myself to do, especially the one from New Year’s? Well, what I realized was that this change was just something that felt very true to my identity. This change wasn’t a change that I felt I ought to do due to social pressures or whatever I felt would be a success. I simply just thought to myself, “I no longer want to be a person who spends every hour of the day using social media taking me away from other things I wish to do.”
I vaguely recall James Clear’s book, Atomic Habits, talking about this framing of using your identity to enact change in your habits and behaviors and felt this idea would resonate with people, so if you haven’t read the book or need a reminder of what the book talks about, definitely check it out. Whether it’s social media or whatever change you want, be true to yourself and commit it as part of who you are. Your behavior change is not just an action you have to do, it’s something you need to.
Show Up
Related to this idea of identity and behavior change is this idea of showing up. After all, how can you become the person you’re trying to be if you’re not actually doing the work? One of the worries people have is that if they do try something new or something they want to pursue, they get worried about what people think. The peer-pressure of what other people think often gets them stopping. This is where Tim Ferriss’s episode with Jerry Seinfeld comes, where he talks about how showing up to entertain people is a win in itself. Whether your material works or not, doing something that you want to do, and doing it alone is a feat. Be proud for showing up.
If you’re going to stand up there by yourself and try and make me laugh, I love you on. I’m not going to criticize anything. (Listen to the whole bit I saved)
What’s Natural
Another Tim Ferriss episode, but couldn’t help but share given the theme of change and identity. I hope that what you took from my reflection isn’t that you too should stop using social media, limiting it to only 30-minutes a day. What I hope you takeaway is that you should do what’s natural for you. Don’t do what people think you need to do. Do what you really feel would be natural for you.
This comes similar to when Tim Ferriss interviews Michael Phelps and Grant Hackett, two swimming athlete beasts, that are just so good at what they do. As you listen to the episode, you can’t help but be in awe of how they’re so obsessed with swimming, from memorizing the records of top athletes in their sport to practicing almost every day, the dedication they have is amazing to me.
…it’s funny because I always had people tell me, Oh, Grant, just just slow down just, you know, enjoy it. Just relax. Don’t… you know…don’t try and do everything to the top level, every single time… I tried that, and you know what, that’s not me (Link To Podcast Snippet)
The quote above really stood out to me. Their competitive nature is just something that’s ingrained in them and rather than trying to reign it in, they just allowed it to be unleashed because that’s how they truly are.
Well, I hope you enjoyed this week’s sharing and if there’s anything that’s on your mind that you want to share, by all means, please do! Till next week 🤓
