What Are You Bored With Today?
I got this email today from my friend James Clear, the author of Atomic Habits.
Whenever I tell people about my approach to habits and behavior change, one of the first questions I receive is: Am I supposed to stick with a small habit forever? It makes sense to start with something tiny, but how do I know when to scale up?
These are important questions for anyone committed to continuous improvement, and I’d like to close the course by offering a few useful ways to think about answering them.
When you start out building a new habit, it’s exciting in the beginning because it’s new. When things are new, it’s novel and interesting. Over time, however, habits become routine. They become learned and the outcomes become expected. Once you know what to expect, habits tend to be less interesting. Sometimes they even become boring. This can be one of the first signals that it’s time to graduate your habit to the next level. You scale up when what was previously challenging is now the new normal.
When your old habit becomes boring, you know it’s time to move on. However, this can be a potential pitfall because, once people get bored, they start looking for something new to do: a new solution, a better approach, a different program. Pretty soon, you jump from one habit to the next, or one program to the next and you never spend enough time focusing on one thing long enough to get results. The key is once you get bored, you stick with the same habit, but find a new detail to master or get interested in.
I find the email extremely intriguing, especially as pertains to our practice, of martial arts.
But of course, as in the case with most of the things I share with you, the knowledge can be universally applied to almost anything.
I see this phenomenon, the boredom factor James talks about, in students some times.
It comes from the fact that it takes 10,000 repetitions to really master a technique, 10,000 hours to master the art- or anything else for that matter.
Yet our natural inclination is to become bored with the required practice far too early.
Now, my Sensei are trained with the teaching techniques of “disguised repetition” for just this reason, but it takes some discipline on the part of the student too.
That’s why I love the advice James gives:
“this can be a potential pitfall because, once people get bored, they start looking for something new to do: a new solution, a better approach, a different program. Pretty soon, you jump from one habit to the next, or one program to the next and you never spend enough time focusing on one thing long enough to get results. The key is once you get bored, you stick with the same habit, but find a new detail to master or get interested in.”
And if you need some help, the Sensei are trained in that too. Ask questions like “what can I do to make this better”, and the Sensei will help you.
And when you’re working on a habit away from the dojo, one to improve yourself academically, professionally, physically, emotionally or in some other area important to you, find another expert with fruit on the tree.
I have found that most successful people love to share their advice with someone who deserves it.
That’s why I always strive to be a deserving student with my mentors. A deserving student is one who asks great questions and then acts on that advice.
Do that.
And let me know how it works out for you. 🙂
Prepare To Live; Empower To Lead!
Grand Master Stephen J. Del Castillo
Founding Master Instructor, Krav Maga Martial Arts
TampaKravMaga.com StephenDelCastillo.com
p.s. Teen night Friday and Elite Training Course (ETC) Saturday. Let me know if you need more info on either.
p.p.s we are closed for Labor Day Monday. Enjoy your weekend.
and keep up the great work in stripe test this week!
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About Grandmaster Stephen J. Del Castillo: Grandmaster Del Castillo is the founding Master Instructor of Krav Maga Martial Arts and has been empowering lives in Pasco and Hillsborough Counties since October of 2000. He is a 7th degree Blackbelt, MBA, author, mentor and success coach, a US Army Veteran and a proud father and grandfather. He is married to Ms. Barbara Del Castillo who helps him run the school. Grand Master Del Castillo began his training in the early 80’s and has high level blackbelts in Tae Kwon Do, Karate, Premier Martial Arts and Krav Maga Martial Arts as well as experience in kickboxing, Jeet Kune Do and Jiujitsu. He has high level instructor certifications from BBSI, IKMF, and KMG and has been featured in numerous Martial Arts publications and also Success magazine. He was a competitive sport karate and American Kickboxing instructor until he enlisted in the US Army where he served in the 82nd Airborne Division, where he won an Army Green to Gold scholarship and proceeded to ROTC and the University of Tampa. He was commissioned in 1992 and went on to serve in Germany with the 3rd Infantry Division and then in several other posts in the US until he left military service to pursue his dream of creating KMMA in 2000.
The Krav MagaMartial Arts Headquarters is in Lutz, FL at 1900 Land O’ Lakes Blvd., 33549. Krav Maga Martial Arts serves Lutz, Land O’ Lakes, Wesley Chapel, and surrounding areas.
See stephendelcastillo.com for more information and to order my book, Developing Your Superpower, Meditations on Mastery, Volume 1.
Also, check us out on Fun4TampaKids & on Go2Karate.com