In his marvelous book, Turning Pro, Steven Pressfield teaches us the importance of developing habits, specifically pro habits vs. amateur habits. Pro habits result in a consistent flow of professional work which is shipped whether or not we “feel” like it. In other words, we show up and do the work because we committed to doing it. Amateurs only show up when it feels right, the mood strikes them, the sun is warm, etc. All of us have both amateur and pro habits…its part of being human. There is nothing wrong with being an amateur. But, if we are seeking to do important work that matters (to us and to others), we must develop pro habits. And by “pro”, I don’t mean getting paid. Sure, our jobs are the most common example of being a professional. We show up, do the work to the best of our ability…rinse and repeat. We do this because we must, not necessarily because we want to every day. If we’re lucky, we’re doing work at a job we like to do…not everyone is so lucky. However, we can turn pro in almost everything. For instance, we can decide to approach exercise professionally. Or, learning, reading, writing, playing an instrument, cleaning, communicating with our kids…the list is endless.
The first order of business to using a professional approach is to decide what is important enough to do even when it’s inconvenient. What is important enough to sacrifice something for? Because all professionals know there will come a time when it feels like it’s not worth it. A pro knows this time is coming, and decides what to do with this feeling or pain before it comes. This way, there is no decision to make when it actually does come…it was already made.
Secondly, as pro’s we need to develop new habits (or perhaps replace old ones). Habits are different than goals. Goals are the outcome (lose 30 pounds, finish writing a book, learn to build a website, etc.). Habits are the practices we need to get there. Too often the practices, the habits we set for ourselves are more like goals…and they’re too big. Exercising an hour each day and consuming 30% less calories seems reasonable if we want to lose weight. But if we’re starting from zero, this can be quite daunting. In fact, it can seem so overwhelming that we either give up before we start or soon after. The key to forming habits is to start small. No, even smaller than that. Start so small that it is borderline ridiculous. How about exercising five minutes each day. Surely, we can all find five minutes each day. Short of an all out crisis (which happens), there’s virtually no chance for failure…because we don’t like to fail at something so “easy”. I once had a conversation with someone who wanted to run to become more healthy, but kept failing because of the peer pressure, the pain and fear of failure to even run a mile. She knew I was into running and asked for my thoughts. My suggestion was simple…get up every day and walk to the mailbox. Then, once she did this without fail, I encouraged her to walk to the end of the street, and so on. Once she mastered walking, I told her she could mix in a short run…I mean short (to the mail box) and then once she was consistently performing at this level, she could run longer. She checked in with me randomly a few months later…she was a runner. Little secret (which you probably already guessed)…doing something five minutes each day turns into ten pretty quickly…and we’re off!
Big practices, like big goals, are monsters. And the most harm they can do is to keep us from starting. Start building pro habits by starting small practices. The monsters don’t pay attention to those until it’s too late.
Hopefully we choose to become pro’s at something…the world needs us. And if we do, consider becoming a five or ten minute pro first…so there’s a better chance of actually being seen.
Which five minute habit will we start today? Choose wisely.