Discovering Passions: 2 Exercises

If you decide to read this post, I warn you that it involves doing two exercises. Reading alone isn't enough. I promise that in the end you'll discover something interesting, and you need to do both exercises to get there.

First exercise: Completed Tasks and Broken Tasks

Try to sharpen your memory and recall some task you set yourself to repeat: exercising, writing once a week, reading about a certain topic, etc. Now write down on a sheet of paper those routines or tasks you set out to do and that you carry out. In another column, write down those tasks, routines, or intentions that you systematically fail to keep. It doesn't matter what the task is, nor does the reason you stopped keeping up that habit matter. Just remember when you've broken it. I'll give you a few minutes to start this exercise.

Done? Ok. Let's continue.

Now please focus on the second list, on the broken tasks. Are you clear on why you didn't carry out that intention? The reason doesn't matter. I just invite you to look at how you felt, or how you feel, about having broken it. I invite you to put a name to that emotion. What is my emotion when I fail to keep my intention? Guilt; resentment; betrayal, laziness, ... And I could keep adding emotions to the list. These are emotions that most people would categorize as "negative emotions" or "judged emotions." Let's leave the exercise there for a moment. We'll continue afterward.

Second exercise: Categorizing customs.

Now let's turn back to our habits, routines, customs, or intentions -those tasks or activities that are part of a known time frequency: days, weeks, fortnights, two-month periods, half-years, or years- and let's do the exercise of labeling them under any of the following 4 categories: Biological routine, Obsessive routine, Persevering routine, and Passionate routine.

In the first category, biological routine, would be the habits related to the basic functioning of our own body, such as hygiene or eating. Under the category of obsessive routine would be all those tasks that, when interrupted or left undone, trigger in each of us an irrepressible need to complete them, an irrational urge to finish what's unfinished — for example, going back to the car to make sure I've locked it, going back into the house to check whether I've turned off the lights. Does that resonate? The third type of routine, which I've called routines based on perseverance, are those repetitive tasks that, without going so far as to condition our behavior obsessively, we insist on carrying out systematically, such as exercising daily or calling a loved one at a certain frequency. Lastly would be the habits or passionate routines, or those tasks we carry out with no set frequency. At first glance they don't seem like routines, and yet we repeat them over time. These are activities that involve no effort to carry out and that become part of our life because they capture our attention to the point of losing track of time and relaxing our mind. They connect us with something that truly inspires us. Some will include in this category listening to music, playing, drawing, or reading a book, or even relaxing by browsing social media. These are tasks carried out spontaneously and without planning, that we usually repeat, and that when left unpracticed for a while, trigger a certain sense of discomfort or inner imbalance.

It might not be easy to fit all our habits into these four categories; if you've kept reading, I invite you to complete this second exercise. One example of a habit or custom for each of the 4 categories is enough. It's fine if the last category is left empty. And it's quite common not to find examples in this last category. They'll show up later, at the end.

The discovery.

To recap, we started from routines, habits, or customs. Then, we reflected on moments of breaking our commitments and assigned a name to the emotion triggered by breaking that task. After that, I invited you to categorize certain tasks into different types of routine.

Now I invite you to connect the two exercises with the following reflection. The greater the desire to carry out a task, the less resentment or self-reproach that comes from breaking it. The greater the need or obsessive weight in the habit or custom, the greater the connection with emotions we file under negative. Those emotions we usually run from: anger, guilt, laziness, or resentment.

The greater the desire to carry out a task, the less resentment or self-reproach that comes from breaking it.

Additionally, the fourth category of habits may be left without personal examples because human beings tend to eliminate from their day-to-day those tasks that don't contribute to their work or to supporting and providing for their loved ones. This sounds rather "Maslowian." And it is precisely these tasks that should be turned into habits, since they're the kind of actions that connect us with our abilities or our gifts. Those that make each of us a special being, different from everyone else. Those tasks that make us unique. If you turn these tasks into your day-to-day and, on top of that, manage to make them your main source of income, I think you'll be very close to having made your dreams come true. And at first glance, the exercise doesn't seem difficult.

This can be summed up in a simple sentence: The more I connect my habits to my desires, the fewer needs are part of my routine, the closer I am to my purpose in life. And on top of that, the gift is that these tasks require no effort because I enjoy doing them. That's why one loses track of time when immersed in them. It's a perfect state of continuous inspiration.

The discovery lies in the personal exercise of now writing down all those tasks I haven't practiced in a while, and that when I do practice them, make me feel 100% focused, my creativity becomes unstoppable in that moment, I lose track of time, I enjoy the moment, and there's no sense of effort. Those tasks make me forget my problems. They're tasks whose performance is intensely rewarding for the mere fact of doing them.

It seems that spending time turning the fourth category into a true routine has its reward, doesn't it? Now I'm sure you'll go back to the first exercise and decide to start filling the first column with more tasks from this fourth category. I think you'll be giving yourself a great gift. Congratulations.

[To discover more about your desires and those tasks that connect you with your purpose, I invite you to look further into Mihály Cíkszentmihályi and The Psychology of Optimal Experience].

This post was originally published on http://bernardocrespovelasco.blogspot.com.es/2014/07/2-ejercicios-para-transformar-tu-rutina.html

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Bernardo Crespo is a certified Ontological Coach through Newfield Network in Bogotá (Colombia). Degree in Business Administration from UCLM and final year of a BA Honours in Management and Economics, University of St Andrews.
Executive Master's in Relationship Marketing, CRM, and E-Commerce from ICEMD, and lecturer at various business schools in Spain.
I have discovered, and continue discovering, the beauty of play applied outside of play #gamification
Currently I work as Digital Marketing Manager at BBVA Spain.