Beautifully You

How To Be 1% Better Everyday

September 21, 2021 Kayla Mctaggart Season 1 Episode 8
Beautifully You
How To Be 1% Better Everyday
Show Notes Transcript

Success isn't about making massive leaps towards bettering yourself, it's about becoming 1% better everyday to make long-term progress. In today's episode, I will teach you how you too can become 1% better every single day to breathe into your limitless life.
 
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What is up you guys, it’s your girl Kayla! & Welcome to the beautifully you podcast! The podcast that will inspire you to live audaciously and unapologetically love yourself.

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In today’s episode we’re going to be talking about How you can become 1% Better, every single day through the power of habits. This is a topic that I have a huge passion for, so I’m quite excited to dive right into this episode with you.

So, habits are defined as a regular tendency or practice, especially one that is hard to give up. I think that habits have gained a bit of a bad rap over the past decade or so, because they’ve become so associated with bad habits, rather than good habits. When, the definition of a habit is just something that is done regularly, like a routine.  

So why have habits become so much more associated with bad habits than with good ones?

Because it’s a lot easier to create and stick to a bad habit, than it is to create and stick to a good habit. 

Here’s an example. Let’s say you started going to the gym to lose some weight and feel better about yourself, good habit. The first few days go great! You have a lot of motivation, you’re excited to see this new version of yourself and all is going well. But then a few weeks pass and you’re not seeing any results, aaaaand the motivation dies. And after the peak of motivation passes (which is very short-lived might I add), procrastination sets in. And if you haven’t built up strong will-power within that motivational peak, chances are that you’re going to procrastinate going to the gym, and you’ll actually begin to bargain with yourself about why you SHOULDN’T go to the gym, to validate your procrastination. It’s a vicious cycle I know, but this is something that happens so regularly when people try to adopt a new, healthier habit.  

The reason for this is because it’s a lot easier to procrastinate doing something that you think will be harder for you to do but have better outcomes in the long run, than it is for you to actually work up the motivation to do it in the first place.

 If you were told that you could have a million dollars, but you’d have to sign a contract that stated you’d work 18 hour days 5 days a week for the next 20 years to get it, would you do it? Now, initially that probably sounds really good to some people! Maybe you caught yourself saying “duh”. But then as you really start to think about it, you’ll begin to think “yeah, but is it really worth it”? as you weigh your options. And there it goes, did you see it? That was will-power exiting the chat. 

There are multiple areas within your brain that control your ability to express willpower, like your pre-frontal cortex, but I’m not going to get into the science behind the where and just focus on the why to make things a little easier to understand.

 Our brains are extremely neuroplastic – which means it’s very impressionable and is constantly changing and growing.  So, this quite literally means that you could decide at any given moment to learn a new skill, advance your knowledge, or eliminate a bad habit. Now, our brain’s ability to adapt does become harder as we get older, hence why it’s harder to learn a new language when you’re an adult, but that being said, our brains are still highly versatile as we age.

Unfortunately, though, our brains aren’t versatile on their own, and they must be trained, and conditioned to remember and favor the more positive habits, as opposed to the negative ones.  

And this is where the importance of habits comes in. Every time you do something that you’d rather procrastinate; like doing the dishes, waking up early, folding your laundry, going to the gym, or studying, this increases your willpower, which in turn, increases your ability to avoid unhealthy habits, and welcome healthy ones. 

So in a way, doing things that may seem unfavorable at times (such as cleaning the house), actually makes it easier for us to prioritize the things in life that will support our personal growth and development the most. 

When people set goals, typically people set large ones, and try to make massive leaps towards the goals that they make, rather than slowly and slightly adjusting daily habits and behaviors. But when people set large goals and attempt to make large leaps rather than small ones, it often ends in frustration, burnout, and failure. 

When people set long-term goals, people are more likely to over-estimate their progress, whereas with short-term goals, the opposite happens. When making small goals, people are more likely to under-estimate just how much they can improve (which actually leads to better outcomes). And I want you to use this to your advantage.

So say you’re going to the gym and your last week’s max reps during squats was 6 reps at 250 pounds, this week, try 255, not 275. Increasing your progression by smaller increments won’t seem like it’s that big of a deal in the moment, but keep track of your progress, because you’ll be surprised of how much you’ll improve. 

The goal of success is not about making massive strides in growth and personal development, it’s about becoming a tiny bit better every single day. Hence, you become 1% better every day. 

Which is 37x better in 365 days JUST by being 1% better every single day. 

 This is why morning routines are SO important. 

 I emphasize to every single one of my clients just how important it is to prioritize their morning routines, which I actually call “Self-care morning routines”, because really, that’s what a morning routine is all about. It’s all about setting sometime aside in your morning to appreciate who you are, what you have and showing the temple that you call home some love and affection. Some of my favorite morning routines are meditating, yoga, reading, affirmations, skin care, drinking green tea, practicing gratitude, listening to a podcast, working out and taking my daily vitamins, but your self-care morning routine can include pretty well anything that allows you to prioritize mindfulness. 

Morning routines are CRUCIAL to our personal growth and development, and many people underestimate just how life-changing simple affirmations and meditation can be. But if I could tell you the top 2 things that differentiates the most successful clients in my programs from the rest, it’s their ability to truly prioritize daily meditation and affirmations. And the reason why these 2 things are key to success is because practicing these things build willpower. The most common thing I hear from my clients when I tell them they have to prioritize a daily morning routine is “but do I really have to do it daily”? Well, no you don’t. But if you want to eliminate anxiety, negative self-talk, self-doubt, people pleasing, and self-sabotage, then yes you do. Because every single time you check something off your morning routine, you’re strengthening your brains ability to eliminate the negative habits that no longer serve you, to  more room for the positive habits that you want to welcome more of into your life.  

Habits typically take 2-3 months to completely solidify, but many people fall into the belief that they can adopt a new morning routine or eliminate a bad habit for a week and see radical results within that time. But then when they don’t, they then become frustrated and give up because they haven’t seen any progress. And this right here is why so many people fail to lose weight, quit smoking, get out of debt or quit drinking. And don’t get me wrong, as amazing as it would be to quit biting my nails in a week, that’s unfortunately not the case.  

Something I use with my clients is called the “line of breakthrough”, this is also called the plateau, cause well, a lines a plateau. That was a bad joke. But I use this line to signify when people are putting in so much work to get a result but aren’t experiencing results as quickly as they expected to. It’s a rule of life that 95% of success is failure, and it’s proven that majority of the time, people give up right before they succeed. The line of breakthrough is the resemblance that when you’re experiencing stagnancy, your breakthrough is right around the corner, you just have to keep going. 

Progress takes time. Especially when it comes to personal development. And I know it can be easier at times to give up instead of tirelessly pushing forward without seeing any improvements. But the next time you want to give up, take the easier route or fall back into an old habit. Remind yourself, THIS is your line of breakthrough. 

Don’t falter, don’t detour. Just. Keep. Going.

  If you liked this episode, please hit that subscribe button so you never miss and episode and please please please share this episode to your stories on Instagram and tag this podcast to share this episode with other people and hopefully inspire another person the same way that it has inspired you. 

  I appreciate you. And don’t forget to audaciously and unapologetically love yourself today. See you next time beauty.