Finding Certainty in Uncertain Times
Fear surrounds us.
It’s on nearly every TV channel, every scroll of social media, and every conversation with friends and family.
We have never seen uncertainty like we are experiencing right now.
But every person can create certainty by adopting daily habits that incorporate four key routines. In today’s article, I will share with you the process I use daily to stand in certainty and give myself the best chance to face and overcome the overwhelming chaos of fear that surrounds us.
Currently, your day probably starts in one of three ways:
A) You get out of bed, suck down some coffee, and then launch yourself into whatever must be done today;
B) You get out of bed, suck down some coffee, turn on the tv, flip through social media, and get caught up on the world around you before you start your day, or:
C) You get out of bed and launch yourself into a series of positive habits, whether it’s reading, meditation, or exercise before you even consider looking at the news, your phone, or the list of to-dos.
If you’re living scenario A or B, you’re losing before your day even begins.
If you’re living scenario C, you’ve at least given yourself a fighting chance at finding certainty. To maximize that effort, you can improve that morning experience by assuring your routine includes these four attributes:
It impacts your Body.
It impacts your Being.
It impacts your Balance
It impacts your Business
It Impacts Your Body
In November, I purchased a new truck. Since I began driving nearly three decades ago, I have purchased nine or ten new vehicles. That’s the beauty of automobiles: when they start to show some wear or tear or develop a few dents and dings, you can trade them in and get something different.
But life only gives you one body. Sure, you may be able to upgrade some parts along the way, but it’s up to you to maintain your body vehicle for life, to keep it well-tuned and running. If you fail to do so, you\’ll break down and end up in the junkyard long before your race was meant to end.
As such, your body may be your most important attribute to maintain. I’m neither a physical trainer nor a nutritionist, and you can easily access a ton of information on how to manage your health and nutrition.
But it doesn’t need to be that hard. You can achieve the Body attribute daily by committing to two simple activities daily:
Make yourself sweat.
Drink or eat something green.
If you commit to these two simple items, you will have assured yourself that you did at least something today to improve your fitness and fuel. You’ve turned on your engine and let it warm up before heading off to the races.
It Impacts Your Being
According to the Laboratory of Neuro Imaging at the University of South Carolina, we experience, on average, 48.6 thoughts per minute, which adds up to nearly 70,000 thoughts per day. That doesn’t include the 2 1/2 hours a day we spend on social media and the 5-plus hours a day watching TV, subjecting ourselves to countless articles, opinions, and an endless stream of noise.
Being can mean many things. It may mean spirituality. It may be self-worth and self-confidence. It may be connecting to Mother Earth. Whatever it means for you, it cannot happen unless you create the space for it to happen. It’s taking time to pause and hear the silence in between the waves of noise. It’s taking the time daily to recognize all those thoughts and messages can happen without you having to respond. It’s understanding you don’t have to participate in every argument you are invited to.
To improve your being routine, complete two simple tasks a day:
Meditate for at least five minutes.
Write down how you’re feeling.
Not sure how to meditate? The only type of meditation that is wrong is no meditation. The easiest way for most people to get started is to use the Breathe app on your Apple Watch or download a guided meditation app like Calm, Headspace, or my favorite, Insight Timer.
Not sure how to journal? It can be simple, too. You can make three notes to yourself to get started.
How are you feeling today?
What is the one thing you are grateful for today?
What is are three things you want to accomplish today?
Start there, and you’ll improve as you go. Doing those activities daily will help you tune into what’s happening emotionally and mentally within and allow you to take control of your mindset before you subordinate it to all the other needy bastards out there competing for your attention.
It Impacts Your Balance
I once heard a quote from an unknown source that said,”If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
We humans, for the most part, strive to achieve great things in life, which means we need the love, friendship, and companionship of others. We are a social people, even during a stay-in-place order. The conversation about Balance is finding a way daily to nurture those most important relationships.
Adopting this daily routine has a compound effect; it empowers you to make a deposit in someone else’s life while simultaneously receiving the benefits that naturally occur when you perform an act of kindness.
Every day, you’re going to send a message to someone you care about. It can be a handwritten note, a text message, a video, or an audio recording. It doesn’t matter, make sure you send a note to:
Your spouse or partner
Your child or child(ren)
If you have neither, pick two people who mean something to you. For bonus points, include in your note one of three phrases, I honor you because…, I love you when…, or I appreciate you for.
Use your notes to lift them up, make a deposit, connect, and be vulnerable. If you do this daily, you will have a bank account with a substantial deposit available should an unexpected day arise in the future when you need to make a withdrawal.
If that day never comes, then you will have done something nice for someone and that’s pretty cool too.
One quick caveat: please do this without expecting or needing a response. If you wish a response, it will stop being about the other person.
It Impacts Your Business
At the end of the day, it doesn’t do much good to have created certainty if you don’t use that to help you create or produce. Whatever your business may be, part of building positive daily habits is to help you increase your capacity to make and create.
If you've developed the three habits above, you’ve already experienced a significant increase in your ability to tackle the day with efficacy and efficiency. However, you can add a little more fuel to the fire by developing these two habits too:
Commit to reading 10 pages of a book or at least 10 minutes of learning,
Share with someone what you’ve learned.
The most successful people you know never stop learning. And while you will gain an incredible amount of knowledge over a lifetime through your own life experiences, you can accelerate that by learning from others. Whether it\’s a skill, a characteristic, or simply a broader understanding of history and how the world works, consuming information will help you expand your ability to solve problems and adopt new ways of thinking.
If you just read 10 pages a day, you will have completed 10-12 new books a year. If you consume just 10 minutes of instructional videos, podcasts, or audiobooks daily, you will have set aside nearly 2.5 days over the year dedicated to learning.
And why would you like to share? When you share, you anchor those lessons and allow them to become your own.
These four attributes – Body, Being, Balance, and Business – when built into your daily habits will transform your ability to meet and overcome the chaos of life. It will help you establish the foundation needed to stand like a lighthouse on the shore during the most outlandish of storms.
Now, I didn’t find these routines on my own. There are many wonderful mentors available who can help you better understand the art and science of effective morning routines. If you’d like to learn more, I encourage you to check out "The 5 A.M. Club" by Robin Sharma.
Whatever you do, do something. Give yourself the best chance to succeed daily. You are your number one investment, and you can quickly develop everything you need to be successful.
How do I know? It’s already within you.
–