On habits and coffee

I've been struggling to get back to my habits. I think part of the reason of that might have been trying to do too much too quickly. It is quite like me to want to rush things. Even self-improvement. Which is silly. I am quite aware that this is a long-con. It starts out as unnatural practice. Might even stay that way for years. But, eventually you succeed in tricking yourself. Your thinking changes to believe that thing that you'd set on "improving".

But I guess reading all those habits books earlier this year got me impatient. It felt -so- close. SO doable. But in my rash rush, I burned out. I'm slowly getting back into the habits that I'd decided to grit. But I'm also realizing a few that I am happy to quit.

Waking up in the morning? Grit. Reading books instead of social media? Grit. Sourdough Baking instead of buying bread/baking with yeast? Quit. Running every other day? Quit. Walking every day with my dogs 1+ miles? Grit. Meditating every night? Grit. Flossing( my dentist will get cranky otherwise...) grit - but I'm not happy about it. Writing every morning? Grit - but modify.

This list is not exhaustive (but perhaps there ought to be one that is?) I think it might be time to revisit a the "Tiny Habits" book again. Just so I can solidify the absolute minimums I can do for these habits to keep them alive. I think re-reading the book will help me in other ways as well. It might give me more of a solid footing to establish a habit on self-compassion. I had thought t hat meditating every night would be the way to do this, but i don't know if it's working. I recently read Eric Barker's book * Barking up the wrong tree* and he defines self-compassion as something that exists outside of self-esteem (low/high). That level of forgiveness and understanding is not something I see in myself. He mentions that esteem and confidence often come with a very critical inner voice - I can relate to this. When I'm doing well the critic is complaining about what could be done better. When I'm not, everything is my fault. Zero compassion. Even with mindfulness, it seems like I might be only practicing it when I am meditating and not much else. In the book Barker mentions that self-compassion grew in subjects that wrote down things even if that didn't come naturally (i.e. they were tasked to do so). This resulted in them becoming more self-compassionate and eventually happier. That is. a habit that I would like to add with preferably a "tiny habit" mentality.

It has been weirdly difficult to shake out the FOMO of social media. I don't really -care- about what is happening on instagram/reddit/tumblr, but it still really bothers me. Currently I'm still not allowing myself to install or visit these on my phone and main browser on laptop. I can (for limited times) access them via incognito or another browser without logging in. I don't like the exemption honestly. This should be one of the habits that I grit through and be rid of. One thing I notice is that when I spend too much time on these platform, I never come out of it thinking "I'm glad I did that!". They just serve to make me feel even MORE FOMO. That's kind oif the point, right? Algorithms want me to return. Otherwise they would be chronological and I could pick up where I left of - and more importantly, there would be an end to the feed. I found out of that Tumblr and Reddit support RSS, so I've started pulling them into my feed reader. I don't like that I haven't been able to shake off my reliance on them. But at least this way, I can be rid of the algorithm / endless feed issue and get a "Social Media LITE" experience. RSS feeds also detangle the content from the social aspect of it (i.e. no commenting, upvoting etc). I've translated instagram into a folder of friends/colleages bookmarks that I want to be updated on - so I can just right click and open a window with all those profile pages. These have an end. I can hop on, check if they've updated, and hop off. It would be nice if instagram supported RSS, but alas they do not. I know RSS-Bridge exists, but it has been finnicky in my prior experience and I haven't rolled out my own self-hosted option. I am testing out this browser extension called fraidy cat , which might actually be the way to go - I just wish it supported a better way of backing up.

The other thing that is really drawing me to self-compassion as a practice is the "care" aspect of it. Barker says something that left me stupefied. "You are the only person that is able to care for you 24/7" or something in that ballpark. Now, this probably sounds like common-sense "duh" to most folk. But for me, it was kind of revolutionary. My inner dialogue is often just an array of disingenuous and snarky comments. The thought that it could be something other than that felt disarming. Even in my exercises in mindfulness the negative chatter were louder. The positive thinking was nonexistent or so soft that it may as well have been. Even so, most of the time the type of meditation I practiced was focusing on bodily sensations and keeping an empty mind. The self-compassionate thinking and meditating wasn't something I've tried. I'm not sure what shape the habit will take form. Perhaps I will integrate it with my morning writing and "force" myself to think wholly about what I've done. The good, the bad, and what can be done to improve it. With the explicit understanding that the good in that equation is just as important as the rest (and cannot be skipped). Maybe the minimum "habit" task is to write a statement of what I've done/feel/thought that is good. The good, because that's what is hardest for me to envision- my inner critic does a good job of the other two.

I got a tiny bottle of Colcafe instant coffee from the grocers yesterday. Sometimes I crave instant coffee to contrast it to the better brews. Othertimes, it is a nostalgic reminder of the smell of my Kathmandu childhood. Folgers, Maxwell Home, Bru, Colcafe, and even NesCafe meet it (though nestle products are banned in my household). I hadn't had it in almost two decades.