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We have spent decades if not centuries pondering what food to eat for optimal health, wellness and fitness. In fact, our obsession with what to eat has enabled a multibillion-dollar diet industry, as well as consumed an enormous amount of our time and money. It is safe to say that in 2020 most people at least know they should pay attention to what they are eating. Most are asking the questions, reading the magazines, blogs and books, trying new food plans and diets, and doing their best to stay up to date on the newest guidelines and trends. So how is it that we spend so much time and money on what we feed our bodies, and so little, if any on what we feed our minds?
We have gotten to a point where most of us understand that you are what you eat. Is it such a stretch for us to also accept that you are what you think? Lao Tzu said it centuries ago, “Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.” If our thoughts become our destiny, could the food we’re feeding our minds be holding us back? Could we be making different choices that will ignite higher performance?
According to Shawn Achor, New York Times bestselling author of Big Potential, The Happiness Advantage, “Training your brain to be positive is not so different from training your muscles at the gym. Recent research on neuroplasticity-the ability of the brain to change even in adulthood-reveals that as you develop new habits, you rewire the brain.” Shawn also says, “Research shows that when people work with a positive mind-set, performance on nearly every level-productivity, creativity, engagement-improves.”
Are your habits training your brain to be positive? We are so fortunate to live in a time when we have information at our fingertips 24 hours a day, multiple devices coming at us at once. News, information, opinions, graphics, blogs, vlogs, podcasts…We have the opportunity to learn almost anything, educate ourselves, be entertained, and provide value to others through various outlets. Yet left to our own devices, we can develop unconscious and sometimes destructive habits. With so many options at our fingertips, how do we move from unconscious habits to choosing what we feed our minds?
For most of us, feeding our mind begins first thing in the morning. We wake up, look at our phone, and tune into a myriad of options: Facebook, Instagram, twitter, emails, slack…This has become a daily habit for so many that it is unconscious. On first blush, it gives us the dopamine rush we are addicted to. How many likes do I have; how many followers do I have? Once we finish the items that give us a rush, we tend to begin the information search. How many emails do I have? I’ll answer them to get that out of the way. What is happening today? I’ll tune in to my favorite news sources.
“How is it that we spend so much time and money on what we feed our bodies, and so little, if any on what we feed our minds?”
The challenge with this daily often unconscious habit is, at some point in this routine, we suddenly find ourselves looking at what others are doing, how many followers and likes they have, leading to comparison, and often down a slippery slope leading to negativity, offsetting our dopamine rush. Same with the news. Unless you’re tuning into John Krasinski’s Some Good News, most of us are tuning in to what’s not working, a dramatized version of a microcosm of an issue. This can feed into fear, anxiety, and scarcity. Not the best way to set up our day.
Try this:
· Start with something good. Stay away from social media, emails, news, and feed your mind something positive. Maybe start with a book, positive quotes, meditation, movement and exercise, journaling, a positive podcast. A few apps I use include Headspace for meditation; podcasts include Unlocking Us with Brene Brown, Feel Better Live More with Dr. Rangan Chatterjee, and I do a 5-minute journal every morning. Whatever your routine is, choose options that support your vision of the value you bring. Choose options that will help you learn and grow into your best self. Choose options that will help you create your desired destiny.
· Choose and schedule a time in the day to look at and respond to emails and manage your social media.
· At this time when we are particularly inundated with news, carefully manage the amount of time you spend, volume of news you consume, as well as your news sources.
2. Choose a limited time to indulge in your guilty pleasure.
As with food, the minute someone tells me I can’t have sweets, all I want are sweets. The same goes for the mind. The minute I hear that I can’t have my guilty pleasures, that’s all I want. Rather than going cold turkey, choose the amount of time you spend in your guilty pleasure. I can get lost in Pinterest and waste away hours without any specific outcome or goal accomplished. While I’m having fun when I’m doing it, I feel terrible when I snap out of it. Like I was in a trance and wasted time that I can never get back. If you have a guilty pleasure like this, choose a time in the day or week, limit it, and let yourself enjoy. Then get back to feeding your mind the good stuff.
Just like the food you feed your body, choose wisely when feeding the mind. Keep in mind that simple changes done consistently yield positive results. Do these 2 steps consistently for at least 30 days and see how you feel. After 30 days assess if you need to make adjustments to your routine. And look for future blogs on feeding the mind.
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