Habit habit habit. One thing about having my days pretty free is that the exact arc of the day is still sort of difficult to nail down, and my exact habits of life are still being written every day. Meditation practice in the morning? Well, I usually want some tea and water to replenish me from the night, so sitting still right away isn’t very comfortable. Thirsty, hungry. Plus when I practice meditation in the morning it sort makes me sleepy for the day, and a touch of lethargy comes over me. And I can’t have tea first because that’s a lingering, leisurely experience for me, so I’d start meditating like an hour later and it feels too wasteful. And plus I have trouble with caffeinated meditating, too agitated. Man, even as I type this though I’m thinking of all the pro-reasons and pro-practicalities of doing meditation in the morning and how simple the logistics are. So maybe it’s fine. But when to do yoga? Right after meditation practice? Then I’m sort of getting hungry, and trying to focus on yoga in a hungry state isn’t the most productive thing. A little yoghurt and warm water before meditation, and then right into yoga? But I like to read in the mornings, too – my attention is crisp and reading is very productive for me in the morning, and reading for an hour with a pot of tea with honey and milk is soooo pleasant. But reading is a really practical companion in the evening when my energy for other things is almost completely gone, or in the afternoon when a little tea is a good pick me up. Bleh. So that’s the idea. Long story short I would like to have a ritual of existence nailed down so I could liberate that portion of my mind dedicated to the anxiety of shaping my daily sense of productivity, and just get the hell on with it. Habit would be nice.
And good habit-making is difficult - but I think that there is a sort of systemization available for integrating things into your life, which I have handily identified in 5 steps, taking you from initial Exposure all the way to your eventual Enjoyment. These are: Enjoyment, Repetition, Acclimation, Acceptance, and Enjoyment.
I’m getting this from pop music, which I looooove. I love terrible pop music. And I was wondering to myself why it is that I love crappy music so much. When I first hear a crappy pop song, usually I think that it is just another crappy pop song, and I don’t really like it. But then eventually I really like it. When does that happen? Well, that is the story of habituation. (I am sort of drawn to crappy pop music with my sociology/anthropology hat on, but let’s get real, I sort of enjoy it because I am an all-around low brow and that’s how it is, so I am willing to put the radio station on crappy pop song stations in general.)
But anyway, so yeah, first I hear the crappy song and I think that it’s crappy. I associate the crappiness of the music with my very identity, and I am in some way affirming part of myself when I dislike this song. I retain a sense of my fine, fine, discriminating taste, and judgment, and self. Song bad, me good. And then I hear the song again, in the car usually, and if I’m spacing out or drinking coffee or in traffic then I hear most or part of the song again. This Repetition happens several times until I become familiar enough with the tune to have achieved Acclimation. I’m used to it now. It’s crap, but it’s familiar crap, and the offense of its crappiness as an affront to my sense of integrity (I won’t listen to this crap!) diminishes. And then, without even realizing it, Acclimation gives way to Acceptance. This stage of habituation is really important, because it is in this period after repeated exposure that the initial judgment of bad and good truly fades, and is replaced with a kind of familiar semi-neutrality. The song becomes part of the auditory landscape of my very life experience, woven integrally into the fabric of my days. It is the car, it is the billboards, it is the mall, it is the corner coffee shop, it is toast. I can hear it on the radio and still change the channel, but it’s not really to make a point about what I do or don’t like, it’s more like I just don’t feel like hearing that song right then. After acceptance it is a short trip into Enjoyment. Eventually, I will sing along with the song in the car. I will not change the channel. I will be comforted by its familiarity, I will make joke lyrics to its tune, I will see the hidden humanity in its banal, limp, vacuous lyrics. I enjoy it. Just like I order coffee and toast, take my car to the mall, and unconsciously read billboards. It is what is there, and I participate in what is, as though I enjoy it. And I do, I do enjoy it. Song good, me good. There is nothing else to do, nothing else to think anymore.
Well that sounded pretty dark but the point here is that I can follow the pop music formula for enjoyment with respect to specific habits I would like to cultivate for myself. Hmmm there could be a sixth stage, called “Preference,” but I guess that’s for another time. So anyway I have the initial Exposure to most things, and right now I am stuck in the stage of Repetition. I will facilitate my Repetition with deliberate scheduling. Hooray scheduling!
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