Hey Team,
Yesterday’s post was all about asking friends for specific support – borrowing their expertise– but today’s post is reminding you of the expertise you already have.
I know that sounds a bit odd – aren’t you already using your expertise in the service of expanding and enhancing your life?
Maybe.
Or maybe not.
You see, I’m not talking about using your knowledge of yoga to seek out/build a yoga flow or using your research to create a meditation plan, those are useful but they are also direct and obvious applications.
I’m talking about borrowing established techniques from another area of your life to apply to your expansion/enhancement/habit-building process.
Those other areas of your life don’t have to have anything to do with the practices you are trying to implement, they just have to use skills that you can transfer to your new practices.
Perhaps recalling how you created your routines for a new work project might provide clues for you to establish a meditation habit.
Maybe considering how you generate a new grocery list might have information for you about how to create a ongoing strength-training routine that alternates different movements.
Perhaps your start-of-day checklist for the office might have applications for a new wellness routine.
Maybe revisiting times when you persevered with challenges in your volunteer work might show you new ways to persevere with the challenges in the exercise class you are taking.
The thing is, no matter how someone might be feeling in a given moment, we all have successes in different parts of our lives and we have all built skills in a variety of areas. Bringing those successes and skills into a new area lets us remember our victories, provides an opportunity to build on them, AND the whole process gives us another chance to celebrate those victories, to remember our hard work and to relive the good feeling of figuring things out.
Thinking in these terms always reminds me of one of the first times I applied the idea of borrowing my own expertise in my own life:
At one point, my writing practice involved daily writing but I struggled with it because it felt like it was going nowhere, like I was wasting my time.
Luckily, though, in a moment when my mind wandered I realized that a) I wasn’t actually trying to finish anything, the goal was to get used to the idea of writing and b) I already knew how to do something like this because I do drills in Taekwon-do all the time. When I do side-kick drills, it’s not about achieving something in particular in that session, it’s about making sure my body is ready for when I need to do a side-kick in a pattern or in the sparring ring.
When I realized that I already had a baseline skill in do this repeated thing so it’s ready when you need it, it was much easier for me to keep writing every day.
And yes, I know that example is the reverse of what I am asking you to do here but I’m sure you can see how it could have worked just as well the other way!
So, Team, today I am inviting you to consider the following questions. They are all getting at the same thing (finding transferable skills) but they come at if from slightly different angles.
- What do I already know how to do that could help me build this new practice?
- Where have I already found some success and how could I use that knowledge elsewhere?
- How is what I am trying to learn or do similar to something I have already learned?
- If I can’t make a direct connection, is there some element of something I already know that could be useful in building my new practice?
And here is your gold star for your efforts today whether you are identifying your own existing expertise, trying to figure out what expertise you need, or just trying to put one foot in front of the other, literally or metaphorically – it all counts.
Be kind to yourself out there, pretty please!
Go Team Us!
