All successful people speak of things like consistency, passion, and vision as some of the reasons behind their success. They do not tell us why they have remained successful for a long time. I learned of a success principle called the system of reflection and review.
Every admired person has in a way incorporated this system into their lifestyle. The system of reflection and review is the process of evaluating the effects of habits and checking areas of improvement. It is a lifelong system that keeps high-performing individuals and companies ever-productive. I want to call this system the antidote for complacency, compromise, and stagnation.
Developing a good habit is challenging and exciting. The brain puts its energy and focus on learning new habits. Once the habit has been formed, the brain doesn’t pay much attention. It automates the habit.
A learner puts his hands on the steering. After years of learning, he can comfortably steer using one hand even on a busy highway. Driving on one hand is risky but the man does it anyway. His brain has put this skill in automatic mode. The brain’s tendency to automate habits is the reason productivity lowers once a person achieves an admired state of productivity.
Boredom is the other reason the brain can stop paying attention to a habit. The mind leans more on habits that bring excitement. Many people use drugs, watch movies, and spend hours on the phone because these habits guarantee excitement no matter how many times they are applied. Good habits are only exciting at the beginning. Boredom strikes when we engage them repeatedly. We might continue doing the habits but with less seriousness.
Read: How to Break Bad Habits
I excelled academically when I was in Form 3. Towards the end of the year, my performance dropped to an all-time low. My focus had turned from studies to extracurricular activities. I thought I was giving my best until my academic results revealed a different story. I later re-established my study routine and my performance picked up once again. My performance remained at peak level as long as I dedicated a specific time towards study.
It is one thing to be productive and another to remain productive. The brain is a lazy organ. It rather sleep, eat fast food, and rest than work. If we leave the brain to dictate everything we do, we will lose all the good habits we learned. We lose the memory of any skills or habits we stop engaging in. Many of us don’t remember the songs we sang as children because we do not sing them anymore.
The system of reflection and review is the ultimate antidote against the mind’s tendency to lose interest. It reveals the consequences of our decisions. These consequences guide the decisions we make afterward. Essentially, reviewing and reflecting on habits gets us engaged in the details of what we do. It makes us focus on the areas we might have ignored and the areas that need improvement.
Review and reflection also excite the brain as drugs, movies, and fast food do. Reviewing gives the mind a new dimension of the habit. It is a way of hacking the mind’s way of functioning. After every review, we feed the brain with a new area to explore. Regularly doing this keeps us doing the same thing repeatedly with much zeal as if it were the first time. Businessmen like Warren Buffet remain zealous while running their companies by applying this system in their companies and personal lives.
Reviewing and reflection must be lifelong if we want to be productive all years of our lives. We must develop a system that keeps our minds engaged with what we are doing. We can start by establishing reflection as a daily habit. The habit can be as simple as asking yourself how you spent your day before you sleep. You can ask yourself the following questions
- How did I spend my day?
- Did I do everything I planned to do?
- What didn’t I do?
- How can I improve tomorrow?
Regularly asking these questions will give purpose to our days and inspiration to do better the following day. Daily reviews and reflections can become more effective when we answer these questions in a journal.
Reflection is also effective when tracking the effects of specific decisions. Some C.E.Os write down decisions at the beginning of the year and review the consequences after 6 months or 1 year. The consequences might affect the company but the C.E.Os become better at making decisions and doing their job.
Apart from guaranteeing long-term productivity, the system of reflection and reviews stirs creativity and innovation. When we focus on improving an established habit or system, we develop faster and better ways of doing what we are already doing. The power of reflection is the reason smartphones have been improving throughout the years.
Apple Company developed one phone every year for the first five years. The power of reflection has doubled their production over the years. Now, they can produce 2 advanced and sophisticated phone brands in a year. Kenyan Athlete Kipchoge Keino and Footballer Christiano Ronaldo are also popular for maximizing the power of reflection and reviews to amplify their productivity.
The first step to becoming successful is establishing a good habit. The secret of sustaining growth for a long time is putting into practice review and reflection. Habits must be improved, otherwise, the mind will ensure we lose the seriousness we first started with. We must continually check the effects of our habits, improve areas that need correction, and eliminate the weaknesses in our system. Other than ensuring we have sustained success for a long time, reflections and reviews give life to the habits we struggle so much to develop.
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