Old habits die hard: An audit to your current situation

You’ve decided to bet on yourself. All the risk, but also all the reward. After about a month, you start to settle into a routine and it seems eerily familiar… actually, it’s starting to feel exactly like the job you left just before this… whoa.  

Welcome to safety seeking. Yes, that’s right, the situation you loathed in the past actually created an opportunity for you to feel safe and secure in your old routine. But… but… that’s not what you signed up for! So, let’s help you recognize, uncover unwanted trends, and audit your current situation to help shape your future.

Recently I was talking with a 1:1 mentor client of mine and we had this massive revelation: As she explained to me her current schedule in an attempt to get her some time back, it mimicked her old work schedule. When I asked her what she loved about her old job it was all the things we love as coaches and rehab pros: the people, the results, the interaction, the “ah-ha” moments… What did she hate? The schedule… A split day that dragged on for about 12 hours in order to accumulate enough clients and hours to pay the bills.

Me: You do realize you’ve replicated your old schedule, right?

Her:

Now, what is it about familiarity that we run to in entrepreneurship (and life), when the world is our oyster. Generally, we are seeking familiar boundaries that we have instilled on ourselves which we know can yield an outcome, even if those boundaries were a part of the prior issue. The first step in reconstructing our life is auditing our situation:

1. What were the things you’ve enjoyed and want to keep as a part of your new routine?

This could be things like a morning ritual, a certain start or end time, a mid-day workout, etc.

2. What were the things you disliked from your prior jobs?

Maybe it was working weekends, a long schedule, paperwork, or the inability to be flexible with your day.

Once you have outlined what you liked and didn’t like, you can start the audit.

How much of your current day is consumed with old habits that simply made their way into your new routine out of familiarity? Now that you recognize this, you have the opportunity to break the pattern. You might feel uncomfortable doing this and maybe even “lazy” as that’s how others have made you feel in the past, but you know you can perform. You’ve never missed a deadline and you won’t start now.

Once the audit of your current situation is complete you can start crafting:

When do you want your day to start?

Would you like a slow morning or one filled with deep work?

When do you want to workout?

When do you want to do your day to end?

And so on!

The best gift you can give yourself is to work within and maintain the boundaries that you’ve set. This will feel difficult at first, but you’ll get better at it. Just like you did in the gym. Boundaries that will protect your energy and allow you to deliver top tier results!