On belief

Since resolving some time ago not to make any New Year’s resolutions, I am much the happier for it. Even so, I still get caught up in the idea of New Year, New Me. Of course this burst of enthusiasm doesn’t last past the end of January, mostly because the old me works perfectly fine, if a little creakily on occasion. But I do have a stumbling block that I would like to overcome, or preferably sneak past when it is not looking. I find that the major challenge of designing something and putting it out in the world is not coming up with ideas or executing the design but rather having the confidence and courage to tell folks about it. It does not come naturally to me. I have to work at it. Grand resolutions won’t cut it. I know if I am to have any success at all in becoming more comfortable talking out loud and in public about my work, I have to make a habit of it.

In an effort to find out more about habits, how they are formed and how they can be changed, I have invested in The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. It is an absolutely fascinating read and probably one of the most inspirational books I have bought in quite some time. For now I understand how the habit loop works; how habits create indelible but not unchangeable patterns in our brains; how habits can be harnessed on an individual, organisational and even societal level to create change; and how organisations can use our habits to further their own ends without our even being aware of it, some of which makes for sobering reading. If you have any interest at all in this area, I would urge you to read his book.

Towards the end of the book, Duhigg quotes William James, brother to the famous Henry, and no less famous himself though I confess that I knew nothing of him. I make no attempt to paraphrase and I shamelessly quote Duhigg quoting James…

“…he [William James] would famously write that the will to believe is the most important ingredient in creating belief in change. And that one of the most important methods for creating that belief was habits. Habits, he noted, are what allow us to “do a thing with difficulty the first time, but soon to do it more and more easily, and finally, with sufficient practice, to do it semi-mechanically, or with hardly any consciousness at all.” Once we choose who we want to be, people grow “to the way in which they have been exercised, just as a sheet of paper or a coat, once creased or folded, tends to fall forever afterward into the same identical folds.”

Powerful stuff, I think, and with the added bonus that James was writing from his own life experience.

Duhigg then notes…“If you believe you can change – if you make it a habit – the change becomes real. This is the real power of habit: the insight that your habits are what you choose them to be… The way we habitually think of our surroundings and ourselves create the worlds that each of us inhabit.”

And with that in mind, for the last little while I have been putting together a brochure, finally having wrestled the recalcitrant publishing program into submission. It is almost ready. My first step in creating my new “happy to talk about my work” habit is to send it out. Let’s see how I do.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year