Over the last five years or so, as I’ve worked with thousands of people on changing their habits, I’ve come to a realization: dissatisfaction with ourselves is a pretty universal phenomenon.
Author: Leo Babauta
Leo Babauta is a simplicity blogger & author. He created Zen Habits, a Top 25 blog with a million readers. He’s also a best-selling author, a husband, father of six children, and a vegan. In 2010 moved from Guam to the San Francisco Bay Area, where he leads a simple life.
My Mission: Help the World Transform Fear into Openness & Joy
When I started Zen Habits 10 years ago, I simply wanted to share what I’d been learning about changing my habits and simplifying my life with others. Then something magical happened.
Finding Beauty in Every Freakin’ Moment, No Matter What
How often are we anxious, frustrated, looking forward to something coming up, unhappy with ourselves, unhappy with others? How often are we not happy with what’s going on in this present moment? What if we could, instead, be completely in love with this moment? What if, no matter what happened, we could find the beauty, joy, and gratitude in the moment as it happens? Let’s make it so.
The 5 Keys to Forming Any Habit
We all struggle with our habits — sticking to them, staying motivated, getting started, dealing with disruptions, it can become a big struggle. And yet, to change our habits is to change our lives. If we can’t make habit changes, we will be stuck in our current way of doing things, which might not be so helpful.
A Guide to Fear Mastery
We normally think of fear as something that’s holding us back, or something to be avoided … but what if we could see it as a powerful tool? What if we could master that tool? We’d become masters at life, able to push through fears of rejection, failure, ridicule, and more.
The Perfect System
Entire industries are built off of this desire to find the perfect system for anything that you have uncertainty about. I know, because I’ve spent a good deal of my life looking for the Perfect System in so many areas. I’ve developed nearly perfect systems in many parts of my life. But today, I’m going to share something I’ve worked years developing: my Perfect System.
The Antidote to Self-Harshness & Resentment
The truth is, these are the biggest problems for most of us. We don’t love ourselves the way we are. We don’t love others the way they are. And the harshness that results is painful and harmful to us and the people we love most. How do we deal with these two poisons?
Three Practices for the Overwhelmed, Stressed, Anxious
You can’t eliminate stress, anxiety or the feeling of being overwhelmed from your life, nor would you want to. However, you can see them as wonderful places to practice some amazing things that will help in all areas of your life.
Undone: How to Change Our Procrastination Patterns
Procrastination starts from an avoidance of something from fear, then becomes a pattern that hardens into a habit. We reinforce this procrastination habit through years of practice, and it hurts us in so many ways in our lives — not only with work tasks, but much more.
The Main Reason Changing Your Life is Tough
Many of us have things we’d like to change: our exercise and diet habits, procrastination and productivity habits, patience and mindfulness habits, quitting bad habits, decluttering and finances, reading and learning and doing all the things we want to do in life. But very often we fall short of our hopes. What’s the problem? Why do we struggle with these changes?