Closing Tabs and Improving 1%
Our generation is faced with all the news, whether it’s a notification from CNN or an Instagram story, which results in a feeling of obligation to care about everything. Hassan Minaj describes this feeling with the term, compassion fatigue in the ‘How America is Causing Global Obesity’ episode of Patriot Act (Netflix). He ended the show with a pitch to pick a few things to not care about in 2020.
Pick a couple things to not care about in 2020, aka three tabs to close, for your sanity, that will allow you to put more focus on things you care about more.
In theory, this makes complete sense. How are we supposed to focus and yield results when we’re faced with 23409823409 things on our mind? I turned the tv off and immediately texted two of my friends with the instructions to watch the episode and be prepared to discuss.
The conversation resulted in agreement that we need to try to eliminate some things that we don’t have the bandwidth to put time and energy into. But I’d be lying if I said I succeeded or even tried to. How would I decide which issues were “not important” enough for me to close? Privilege city over here.
The task remained on my mind as yet another open tab. I wasn’t even able to decide what to close!! It wasn’t until I read Atomic Habits by James Clear when it clicked for me. The premise of Atomic Habits is to show the impact of tiny habits occurring over time to result in remarkable results. The example used was when the Los Angeles Lakers had one of the most talented teams assembled in 1986, but suffered a season ending defeat in the Western Conference Finals. Head coach Pat Riley was determined to have the team play to its potential and implemented a system he called the Career Best Effort program, or CBE. It begins by determining a player’s baseline level of performance and continues with the task to improve at least 1% over the course of the season. This is in every aspect, including best effort spiritually and mentally which would be gauged through review and reflection from the individual. After rolling out this program for 8 months, the Lakers were NBA champions! The following year they won the title again.
Evidently, this notion is applicable in our personal lives for building good habits that will enable us to succeed but also break bad habits that prevent us from living up to our potential. BUT why not combine the philosophy of both ideas to allow us to by making tiny changes over time but also improve ourselves for issues that go beyond us.
For example, I claim to be an animal lover and don’t have the intention of harming our environment but love meat. My guilt over the issue continued but my habits did not follow suit. It wasn’t until I realized that I needed to eliminate the thought of “one person doesn’t matter” or “how much of a difference this will make” and focus on the principle. Reducing my meat consumption to a realistic goal of eating one meatless meal per week is the start that can pave the road for small, tiny changes that can build a better habit for the environment. This same strategy can be applied to a pathway for every issue we deal with as a society. Institutional racism can only be broken by rebuilding the system which requires education and DAILY work from the people in the establishment. Policy can be changed by demanding justice from elected leaders and exercising our right to VOTE.
So, I leave you with a twist to what Hassan presented – How can you improve 1% not just yourself, but for others too? For those who fear that their schedule doesn’t allow going beyond what is being worked on currently, stay tuned for my first Goal Setting/ Planning Tip next week!
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