“Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words. Keep your words positive because your words become your behavior. Keep your behavior positive because your behavior becomes your habits. Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values. Keep your values positive because your values become your destiny.” —Mahatma Gandhi
Habits define us—good ones and bad ones. Some studies show that it takes 21 days to form or break a habit, others say it takes three months. In my opinion, it takes as long as you need it to take. It takes practice but once you fall into it, it’s hard to break.
As many of you know, I used to go to CrossFit. I got into the habit of going 2–3 days during the week and at least once during the weekend. It became a habit. Then I was in a car accident, hurt my back, and stopped going—that became my habit. I traded a good habit for a bad one. In the process, I have gained weight. I need to change that habit to achieve my goal for the year.
Breaking and forming habits (good or bad) is not easy, but these habits have an effect on us in every aspect of our lives. You can choose to be happy or miserable. You can choose to be positive or negative. You can choose.
The things about habits is that once you have them established, they become second nature. There is no question about doing something, you just do it. If this is true, then as Aristotle said, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
If it was easy, you would have already achieved the change you seek. Make excellence a habit.
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Have a great weekend.
—Vijay
About Friday Food for Thought (FFfT)
I frequently attend conferences and retreats on entrepreneurship and leadership and while I am away, the J2 team picks up the slack, allowing me to learn to be better at what I do. I wanted to share what I was learning with my team, so I created the weekly FFfT emails in November of 2015 and have been writing them ever since.
Before long, the J2 staff began sharing the FFfT emails with their friends and family and now other leaders have asked to be included, which led to the creation of this newsletter. I hope you enjoy!