I take action, work on many things at the same time, run quite a few experiments through them and pick up on what has really worked well for me. 

Sometime last year, I invested time and resources in a TweetChat right before one of our Thrive launches. Later that year, I began experimenting with different kinds of landing pages for the launches and other programs that I was launching. 

LinkedIn articles are another form of experiment on the social media side that seem to be working for me. Late last year I did the advent calendar, that focused on not just building content but repurposing what I had built up over the last couple of years. 

As I sat down to write this piece around the power of habit, I realised that experimentation and taking smaller bets, have become a part of my practice. I spoke to a few of my entrepreneur friends and turns out this is what they do too. It becomes an unconscious practice- much like a habit. 

I have always enjoyed writing, but making a practice of doing articles consistently over the last year or more came after much practice and lots of experimentation. This will be my 83rd article on LinkedIn and I am so excited that this has become a practice where I not only get to pick up thoughts from my mind and write on them but also reach out to a larger audience. 

But hang on. What am I actually saying? 

See how this article has a lot of “I” in the beginning. It is because habits start to define who you are. They start building your sense of identity. And while you do rely on intuition or hunches, very soon you realise that excellence is a practice, not a one off chance thing.

When something is working you start noticing it. So don’t worry about predicting ahead of time if it will. Take smaller bets that don’t drain out your resources. Let yourself experiment in small measures and then expand yourself incrementally. Over time you will see that these habits, the ones that give you outcomes are a huge part of your identity. 

As people we are constantly drawn to those who have the same kind of spirit as us. I get especially drawn to those people who talk about what they love doing! When one of us is feeling down and saying things like “i don’t know, I hate doing this”, the others are quick to pull her up outlining one of her habit based behaviours- “that may be, but nobody can get the newcomers to open up the way you do”. 

These are self directional stimuli that we sieve out from what’s happening around us. But these are all about marginal changes in our lives. Taking to articles became much easier after I had been consistently publishing smaller posts for quite some time. I went into it when I thought I could stay committed to the process. 

Habits are about the process. 

Good habits don’t always mean stellar outcomes, it’s also as much about making good of the process. A close friend of mine was super intrigued by the the 5AM club concept. She tweaked it to 6AM for herself and that meant waking up 30 minutes earlier than usual. And she sticks to it 5 days a week. We chatted and she said, you know Shivangi, it’s not like 30 minutes is a lot of time what with getting the kids ready for school soon after and then I am rushing about too. But I wake up when the house is quiet, and it is just getting bright outside. It is some time with myself and I didn’t realise that I was missing that piece of me. I am just better at being me now. For me that is in anyway a stellar outcome, but my friend is sort of fastidious. 

The process of building good habits is transformative.

Good habits start defining who we are. This is my 2nd article on the Power Of Habit and I want to really understand from the ones who are reading this how cognisant are you of your winning habits? And also of the habits that sometimes pull you down?