The Chain of Habit

We cannot improve what we don’t measure

To measure, is is to be conscious of our actions and their resultant outcomes over time. It is often said that to make a new mistake is more forgivable than repeating the same mistake again. Every time there is a major soccer tournament, the number of hospital admissions in the Far East resulting from exhaustion increase phenomenally as soccer crazy fans stay up into the late hours to tune into the games; one person in China died during Euro 2012 after staying up 24 hours for 11 days whilst going to work during the day, and engaging in an unhealthy routine. People often tend to repeat the same, known mistakes, again and again. The English national football team has lost 6 of the last 7 penalty shootouts in major tournaments. It is not a new problem, and has not been addressed from the root. Many experienced people have said that Englands problem with penalties comes down to not learning to maintain a very strong mental equilibrium amidst extremely high pressure, and then learning to executing what all of the players are more than capable of doing; to get the ball into the back of the net, where they have a surface area of 17² meters to aim for, of which the a goalkeeper at any one time can cover less than 15% of. Germany on the other hand, have not lost a penalty since with Uli Hoeneß missed and Germany lost to Czechoslovakia at the European Championships in 1976. The importance of repetition is key; repeating the good habits, like the German football team do, leads to success, and repeating mistakes, like the England football team do with regard to penalties, often leads to successive failure that is very difficult to turn around. If we understand the nature of repetition, we will better be able to situate ourselves.

Recognising the need to improve

It is said that generally bad habits are difficult to give up, and good habits are difficult to take on. This is made worse as one is often influenced by a sense of ego or pride. Why? Because often times, the strengths are ‘strong enough’ to lead to some success, and life is so busy, that one may not be really incentivized to understand their weaknesses and do something about them, unless and until forced by circumstance. Andy Murray, when in the very early stages of his career showed signs of technical class, however compare to others in the game, he lacked physical power and presence on the court. His camp acknowledged this quickly, and within a few months, Murrays physical strength was enhanced through more gym work and a change of diet. Within no time, Andy Murray looked and felt more like a player capable of breaking into the top tier of tennis and now appears to be such a player. Andy Murray and team became conscious of what they needed to do in order to rectify a repeating theme, which in his case happened to be a lack of strength.

The chain of habit

The Vedic teachings emphasise the significance of repetition of favourable and unfavourable actions. They explain in regard to favourable actions, that continued and consistent practice leads to two outcomes; i) a deeper sense of convinction around engaging in favourable actions, and ii) of course the resultant manifestation of positive results. On the contrary, in regard to repeating negative actions, Radhanath Swami explains from the Padma Purana that when one engages in unfavourable actions, not only of course do we i) experience the negative direct outcome from this, which in the working context may involve getting behind on work tasks, losing track of time, and so on, which can hinder one’s progress, but ii) our inclination to repeat the activity grows, and this becomes a vicious cycle of repeated actions; it becomes an addiction, which is very difficult to come out of. Warren Buffet once said, the chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken. Lakshmi Mittal explained that he regularly drives past a golf course en route to work, and plays some rounds of golf before work. One day, as his driver was about to pass the golf course, Lakshmi Mittal told him, Take me straight to work today please. His driver, being close to him, asked why he didn’t want to play golf, especially as he did it every day. He said, Today I felt an urge, and a I don’t like addictions. An impulse to engage in an activity that is potentially unfavourable, can become the cause of our downfall- great leaders are very conscious of this and impose disciplined in regard to it.

Success and failure are intricately linked with the continued repetition of favourable and unfavourable activities respectively. Setting and maintaining good habits begins with an awareness of whether an activity is favourable or unfavourable. Once that is understood, one can chart through their day engaging in the right things by differentiating, and in turn reaffirming their belief in doing the right thing through doing it more and more. Through this way, one can become more conscious of the lure of the bad habits, and minimizing, or not doing them all together. No doubt it is very difficult to practice this consistently, but it all starts with building awareness; if we are not aware of this dynamic, there is very little chance we will stumble across it and get it right. And as one does it more and more, it becomes easier.