3 Crucial Habits of Highly Conscious People

We hear about the importance of habits all the time. About how they will make or break us. How they make us who we are.

Habits, as defined by James Clear in his book Atomic Habits, are “the small decisions you make and the actions you take every day.”

According to researchers at Duke University, habits make up about 40% of our behaviors on a given day. Forty percent.

Now, let’s compare that to actual time in a day. It’s not apples to apples, but humor me so that I can help illustrate the point.

Let’s say we have 15 hours on a given day when we’re awake, thinking, moving, doing. Now imagine 6 hours of that being driven by our habits.

Sit with that for a second. That’s a lot.

That said, I’d imagine it’s safe to assume that there are things we do every single day that are driven by some habits we’re not even aware of. And those habits are the driving forces behind our day-to-day lives.

The good news is, habits are something we can develop and change. It may not be easy, but it’s doable, and when you start making the conscious effort to change or build better habits, your life begins to transform.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.” -Will Durant

Exceptionally conscious people have developed specific habits in order to fine-tune their ability to key into their own thoughts, behaviors, and how they show up for the people around them. These are habits I’ve also put into practice over the last few years, and they’ve proven to serve as critical tools to help me live more consciously.

1. Separate story from fact

In the leadership development book, The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership, the authors dive into a formative discussion on how we can effectively lead others by uncovering our own unconscious beliefs and behaviors.

One concept that sticks out in particular, is under Commitment Number 5: Eliminating Gossip. Within that commitment is the idea of separating fact from story.

What exactly does that mean?

Well, facts are objective. They can’t be argued. My partner is looking at his phone during dinner. Fact.

Stories are interpretations and narratives around the facts. It includes opinions and interpretations. My partner must not enjoy my company, because he’s always on his phone. That’s the story.

—

Fact A: Your friend shows up 15 minutes late to drinks with you after rescheduling twice.

Story A: My friend doesn’t value me, or my time.

Fact B: Your boss asks you to spend some time learning the operations of the business.

Story B: My boss wants me to learn more about this to set me up for a promotion.

—

Whether it’s positive or negative, how often are our reactions in response to the story? The stress, excitement, disappointment, and overthinking generally comes from the narrative around the fact. And stories are not absolute truths, but they sure do a hell of a convincing job making us think they are.

Being able to separate fact from story is a major unlock for the way we see, absorb, and react to situations. It creates awareness around our emotional responses to things we make up (we’re all excellent, creative storytellers). It allows us to silence the noise, detach from our story, and address a given situation objectively.

2. Get Feedback Regularly

Several years ago, I had a leadership coach who said “feedback is a gift.” I blindly agreed with him on the spot, passionately nodding my head up and down like a bobblehead in a car speeding over a giant road bump.

Of course it’s a gift. Obviously.

Then I got a 360 review back from my team, peers, and leadership. I read it and hid it in my notebook to avoid the inevitable breakdown from happening in that moment.

That night, I curled up on my couch to read it again, and cried handfuls of salty, heavy tears. There was some positive stuff in there, but some of it wasn’t “good”, and that shit cut straight to the bone. I was disappointing my team - the very people I cared about - in ways I wasn’t even aware of until then. I felt like a failure.

I mean, how dare we not be perfect by someone else’s standards. (I joke — but seriously, let’s stop being so hard on ourselves, yes?)

My leadership coach and I worked through it. Every single painful one of them. That’s when I really understood what a gift feedback was.

When we hear “gift,” generally our brains go to instant gratification. Someone hands us something, beautifully wrapped, or haphazardly thrown in a bag with some tissue paper on top. I’m Team Bag with the tissue paper, by the way. It’s just so easy and reusable — a gift that literally keeps giving.

We unwrap it using whatever method we choose, and boom. The payoff. Easy, happy, yay.

Feedback is nothing like that. At times, it can be more like a gut punch that leaves you throbbing in pain, reeling. The only unwrapping that happens is your fingers loosening their grip on the fist you just made to instinctively punch back.

The “gift” part comes much later. It shows up as a complicated, evolving culmination of the awareness and work you put in based on what you chose to do with the feedback you received.

That 360 review took my self-awareness game to the next level. My reaction alone was something that I deconstructed as a learning. Where was I getting defensive, and where was I feeling the pain? Why?

Receiving feedback never gets easy. Egos flair, justifications pop up all over the place, and it’s painful. But getting into the habit of asking for, receiving, and giving feedback does make it easier.

From some of the toughest conversations (and experiences) come the most radical breakthroughs.

It’s also important to note here that not all feedback is tough. It also means we get to hear the good stuff about our unique strengths. Soak the good things in like a sponge, and remember to balance the positive and the constructive. It’s easy to be hard on ourselves and focus on what needs work, but we also need, and deserve, to take time to celebrate the good.

3. Let Go of the Things You Can’t Control

Easier said than done, I get it. Going back to the 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership, there’s a section that I have highlighted - and would double-highlight if I could.

“But do a thought experiment with us. What if there is no way the world should be and no way the world shouldn’t be? What if the world just shows up the way the world shows up?…What if curiosity and learning are really the big game, not being right about how things should be? Can you see how this would radically change the way we live our lives?”

Goosebumps every time I read that.

You see, with this mindset, things aren’t happening against us. They’re just happening, and we’re a part of it. And if we can learn from what happens, then ultimately, it’s actually serving a greater good for us.

So instead of “This isn’t how it should be” or “How come this happened to me?” it becomes “What is this teaching me?” and “How is this happening for me?”

We spend so much of our time worrying about the outcomes of things. Things we want. Things we don’t want. Fears of things that may or may not happen. How we can control it - what we can do.

But if one thing is absolute, it’s that things will happen that we can’t control. I mean, look at us, we’re going through the perfect example of this at an epic scale right now (yes, we’re talking about you, Rona).

What we can control is how we react to it. What we make of it.

In her book Swell, Liz Clark, an environmentalist who lived a nomadic lifestyle spending more than a decade sailing around the world, learned the following:

“Difficult people and situations in our lives are our most precious teachers. They give us the greatest opportunities to practice our virtues.”

“If challenges are the tool for liberation, then all I have to do is use the experiences that life provides to keep refining myself and becoming more like that enlightened person on my list of who I want to be.”

All of our experiences - the good and the bad, are here to serve as our teachers. Knowing that, what are the fears that we can let go of?

I still regularly spiral with thoughts of worry or fear. When I recognize the behavior, I’ll take a step back and ask “If the worst-case happened, what could I learn from it?” It’s an exercise pulled from Tim Ferris’ practice of fear-setting, and it’s effective.

Naming the worst-case scenario, and knowing you can learn from it is a critical practice. It neutralizes the fear of the unknown. You’ve named the worst-case. You know it can serve you. From there, you can let it go.

“Incredible change happens in your life when you decide to take control of what you do have power over instead of craving control over what you don’t.” — Steve Marabol

Building these habits doesn’t mean life gets easier, but it does heighten our awareness, which is a critical tool we need to help us navigate situations, relationships, and life, with purpose. It uncovers our perceptions, our wants, and our fears. It helps us understand how we show up, and why we react to or do things a certain way.

Once we’re more aware, we can do things with more intention. We can tune into our thoughts and behaviors and guide them with clarity. We can have more compassion for others. We can focus our energy in a more positive way for ourselves and the people we care about.

Living consciously doesn’t come easy, but establishing these habits can help make it more attainable, one step at a time.