The One Keystone Habit You Need to Succeed
And the techniques you need to build it.
It’s easy to get caught up in the self-perpetuating wave of personal development. We all feel less than, often enough. In the ever-changing, socio-digital world we inhabit, competition is a rite of passage. Facebook and Instagram are, in fact, designed to exploit those feelings and monetize your emotional data.
It’s no wonder the self-improvement market is worth over $10 billion a year and growing, with no shortage of cures for your many poor habits. Yet, if you’re like me, these prescribed self-improvement habits are unlikely to stick. The reason being, most humans don’t identify their keystone habits.
Keystones are those habits that are most intertwined with other habits you may have. Sharing a correlation, that often creates chain reactions of transformation if triggered.
To identify the most important of these keystone habits, as subjective as that may seem, we need to identify one part of our lives we all wish to improve. The more common our problem, the more universal the keystone habit must be to address it.
We can avoid superficial topics as they will likely be addressed by the keystone habit in question. Rather, let’s identify an out of balance condition in our life that has the biggest (w)holistic implications. From there, we can back into a keystone habit that alleviates the out of balance condition and sets you free. Easy peasy!
In my life and consulting work with traders, bankers, athletes, film directors, and cannabis farmers — the answer seems unanimous. The out of balance condition most prevalent to the widest demographic of people and businesses is a lack of clarity.
While our society races, competes, and consumes, we all wonder sometimes,
“Is this the right decision?”
or
“Am I doing enough?”
Self-doubt and indecision (SDI) are the killers of dreams, companies, and lives. SDIs cause eating disorders, addictions, and devastating choices with critical global implications. The only known antidote to SDIs is clarity!
Clarity’s expressions are as many and varied as the souls that inhabit this planet. Some of us struggle with clarity in our day-to-day nutrition choices. Others have difficulty with relationships, lacking the clarity of perspective for meaningful changes. Yet, one keystone habit has the promise of alleviating this wasted potential energy. To make much of the unclear, clear.
Meditation.
Meditation has been a mystery since capitalists realized the awakening trend can be monetized. The David Lynch Foundation offers you the gift of transcendental meditation for a few thousand dollars. A heavy price to sit still!
To demystify meditation, let’s assume it’s any time spent in deliberate, quiet reflection. Muslims meditate five times a day, Hindus and Buddhists meditate twice a day, and so does Ray Dalio. Olympic champion Michael Phelps meditates before every race and attributes this habit to a lifetime of success. So what exactly is the point, and why does every successful person seemingly meditate?
The first part of the question requires a bit of geeking out. If we look inside our brains we’ll find millions of neuron synapses. Gaps between nerve cells that allow information, coded as electric or chemical charges to pass through. These gaps are where bits of information jump from one nerve to another on its way to being analyzed. These synapses machine-gun fire, relaying data from sensors to processors and back again.
Many of those impulses are our conscious and subconscious thoughts. Those thoughts create imprints in our perception that generate feelings. And if feelings are left unresolved, or unfelt — we’ll spend more energy dwelling instead of doing. A recipe for disaster, as you know.
The goal is to create a separation between our firing thoughts and our identification with them. The more space we allow ourselves to make decisions consciously, the more clarity we can cultivate to see our full objective reality.
Think about that test you’ve studied for or job interview you’re about to have. Now ask yourself, are you resting or are you waiting? The natural mind is a space of rest. We know that we are all responsible. Meaning, remaining in a place of rest and able to respond should a response be necessary. Yet isn’t it true that most of us spend our time anxiously waiting? Thrown around by the waves of “what ifs” and “contingency plans.”
While it’s impossible to stop your synapses from firing, it is possible to tame our minds and create more space for clarity to cultivate. Meditators, in all walks of life, have found that this daily practice provides them with unparalleled ability to see and feel clearly.
Meditation allows traders not to panic in volatile markets and see a developing opportunity before the herd. It provides athletes the visualization necessary to see a race as just another routine. And it affords creatives the mindset to activate their flow states more readily.
To summarise:
I. We’re all missing clarity in some capacity
II. That lack of clarity leads to poor decisions
III. Meditation creates space for clarity to cultivate
IV. Those that meditate create a competitive advantage over those that do not.
More importantly, meditation habits begin to affect other habits. This is the keystone magick I was alluding to!
Meditators who feel jittery while sitting will often find the clarity to know to cut or end their coffee habits. Which then starts to improve sleeping habits. Which then gives the meditator more energy and propels them to exercise regularly. Before long, a new being emerges that is more in tune with themselves and is able to optimize their own performance.
Another example of meditation’s keystone powers is my own. In my former career in trading futures and options, I had a very difficult time getting up at 6 am. And an even more difficult time boarding a crowded L train on Bedford Ave. to face a day of work that didn’t inspire me. The latter statement was the problem I was trying to solve. Meditation seemed like a good way to ease my mind while I found my solutions.
Given my schedule, the only way for me to integrate meditation into my day was to wake up earlier. Since I already had a trigger of a 6 am alarm clock, all I needed to do was to change the habits around it.
I set the alarm for 5:40 am and created a set routine that would allow me to meditate, shower, get dressed and still make my train. The routine included a set place to sit. Lighting incense. A 20-minute recording that would signal the beginning an end to the session. And a warm shilajit tea that I would have after the session — my reward.
Within a few weeks, I began to enjoy waking up 20 minutes earlier despite always having hated my 6 am alarm. The routine made me more awake and calm by 7, so the subway didn’t feel tense or crowded. In fact, I started reading books on every subway ride to and from work. The activity now felt peaceful where it used to feel undoable.
I arrived to work each day more awake, peaceful, and knowledgeable. I had more to discuss with my clients. The stacking books on my desk stirred new conversations. Within a few months, I had three job interviews and a completely new outlook on life and my abilities. For more details on the other bio hacks that came out of my keystone meditation habit, check out my article Treat your Bodies Like Ferraris.
Knowing that meditation is a quintessential keystone habit, however, doesn’t make it any closer to being yours! For that, you’re going to need to find a reliable trigger.
Our minds work in cycles of triggers and rewards. Between the two polarities are the habits that we use to bridge the divide. If you’ve never meditated before, simply starting will likely not result in success. Like my alarm clock was an effective trigger for me to create a new routine, you can use anything that triggers you daily. Perhaps combining a positive habit with a trigger for another positive habit!
Use your urge to check your phone in the morning as a trigger to meditate. Resist that urge and allow it to invite you to your morning practice. Once you have completed your practice and had a warm cup of tea to seal it, reward yourself with finally checking your long-awaited email.
Once you’ve identified your trigger, create an authentic meditation routine for yourself. I’ll start you off with the basics so that you’ll literally have no excuses but to sit and drift away!
Akin to the emerging field of psychedelic therapy, set and setting are very important to a successful meditation habit. Pick a place and stick with it. Create a space that’s somewhat special for you. A nice view, or a cozy part of our favorite room. If you build your habits around aspects that are pleasurable, those habits are more likely to stick.
For athletes, this could be a favorite corner of the locker room or under the bleachers where you can find 20 minutes of solitude.
Next, pick a meditation soundtrack that will clearly signal when your sessions begin and end. This could be anything from a recording of absolute silence with a bell at the beginning or end, to my original meditation track when I was playing junior ice hockey (Metallica’s For Whom the Bell Tolls). It doesn’t matter what it is, as long as it allows your mind to float.
Once you’ve been triggered, arrived at your pillow, locker room bench, or what have you, its time to get meditating! Sit upright on the floor, bench, or pillow with your legs crossed. Ideally, pay attention to your hips. They should be higher than your knees. Alternatively, if sitting cross-legged on the floor is a no-go, find a chair and sit upright, with your hands gently placed on our lap.
Close your eyes and take a deep inhale through your nose and exhale fully through your mouth. On the inhale, expand your belly and contract it on the exhale. Repeat this basic clearing breath two more times. Think of this as a mental trigger for your body to get into meditation mode.
While there are thousands of techniques, I’ll provide a few examples of some that have worked for me, my family, and my clients.
108 Meditation.
With eyes closed and breathing in and out through your nose visualize the number 108. With each breath, count down the numbers in your head. 107. 106. 105. Every time your mind wanders and you lose count, go back to the last number you remember and begin again. 67. 66. 65. Until you get to zero.
When you get to zero, take another clearing breath. In through your nose, and fully exhale out of our mouth. Then allow your mind to wander, focusing lightly on your breath before you are signaled to stop.
Transcendental meditation (mantra).
Pick a phrase that means something to you. “I am courageous, I am powerful.” “Let, go.” Or Sadhguru’s infamous “I am not the body, I am not even the mind.” It really doesn’t matter as long as the phrase is something that can become meaningful to you.
With your eyes closed, breathing rhythmically through your nose, repeat your mantra to yourself. With every inhale, visualize saying the first part of the mantra, with every exhale the second. Let…Go…Let…Go. Continue letting go for the duration of the session.
Guided Meditation.
For every type of meditator, there is an able guide with an innovative technique to nurture your habit. Mr. C and Sadhguru may seem like odd fellows in the same sentence, but even techno DJs now offer guided meditation tracks!
This is a great way to feel good about doing it right because you’re guided through every step of the way. There are pros and cons to a guided meditation that need deeper inflection, but anything that creates positive habits is a good place to start.
Now for the secret sauce…
Once you have found your practice, there are only two more steps to solidifying your new habit; rewards and consistency. If you perfect your trigger — habit — reward loop the consistency will come naturally. Hence why successful meditators love meditating, and runners only seem to increase the miles they run each week.
It takes anywhere from 21 to 48 days to reset a habit. To succeed, your short term rewards must be able to keep the incentive alive. At least until the long term benefits begin to roll in and self-fulfill the prophecy! For me, it was the immediate reward of having a cup of tea after meditation that made me look forward to the meditation ritual. The warm tea felt amazing to wake up to after 20 minutes of close-eyed introspection.
Whatever that reward is, make sure to use it to reinforce your habit. Some friends I know write a short reflection of their meditation feelings, which acts as their reward. They can look back at their daily reflections and see themselves transform through their new habits. A massive source of incentive!
With the right incentives, meditation practice will become part of your daily routine, spreading its tentacles to affect other habits. This requires the evolution and transformation of anything stagnant and outdated. Like a wrecking ball cleansing you from the inside, meditation will undoubtedly begin affecting you in unexpected ways.
While most of us share some feelings of laziness and are reluctant to change our lives, we can surely add one new habit into our list of thousands! Especially if this one habit has the power to transform every fiber of our being; propelling us to swim for gold, trade for billions, and create unimaginable works of art and design.
For more information on how to adopt meditation and other keystone habits into your personal or business reality, please shoot me a line and start a conversation. Leonid@DeWarrior.com
