Home » Stop snoozing [Part 1]: The elephant is watching.

Stop snoozing [Part 1]: The elephant is watching.

Credits: Vikas is my pranayama teacher and holistic abundance guru. All credits to him and his teachings for the idea and inspiration for this post (and many others!). Happy Birthday, Vikas ❤️

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Sleep is good.

But hitting that “Snooze” button on your phone, when it rings? Not so good.

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“What’s the harm in getting a few more minutes of sleep, if I can make sure that I’m not late for my meetings?”

Yep. That’s exactly what I was thinking until this morning.

My Pranayama class starts at 5 AM sharp.

“Oh crap. It’s time already?” That’s my reaction when my alarm rings at 4:20 AM.

I snooze it a few times and unhappily get up 15 minutes later. 4:35 AM.

After another 20min of struggling to stay awake, I login into Zoom – a few minutes before class.

Sounds torturous? It is.

But beyond the self-torture, there’s another problem.

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Think of someone you respect the most, who inspires you, like someone you want to become. And then imagine that person constantly watching what you’re doing.

Would you still snooze the alarm? Would you keep dragging yourself through tasks?

Or would you just jump out of bed to impress your idol with your enthusiasm?

Probably the latter.

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Here’s some good news for you: You already have that idol watching you. Every waking hour of your life. It’s called your subconscious mind.

“One-eighth of your mind is your conscious mind, but the other seven-eighths of it is your subconscious mind”Mahatria Ra

“Our ant is the intentional part of the brain, but our elephant is the instinctual, impulsive part of the brain that houses emotions and memories and even guides the body to perform vital functions. While we tend to know our conscious minds (our ants) rather well, we often overlook the power of our elephantine subconscious minds.”Vince Poscente

Think of your subconscious mind as an always alert, silently observing, continually learning, and extremely powerful elephant.

The elephant has another superpower: It decides what you believe about yourself. And unless the elephant is convinced about something you badly want, it won’t let you budge.

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“Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.”James Clear

How do you impress the elephant? How can tap into the elephant’s momentum to drive you forward?

Make a small commitment. Keep the commitment.
And then make another small commitment. And keep that commitment.
Over and over again.

It’ll take a while. You’ll need to be patient. Slowly, but surely, the elephant will wake up. And start to move.

Every time you set your alarm, you’re making a commitment to wake up at a certain time.
When the alarm rings..and you wake up immediately, you’re keeping the commitment.
But if you snooze, you’re failing on the commitment.

The million-dollar question: Now that you know that the elephant is always watching, what are you going to do? 🙂

Note: This is a multi-part series. While waking up without snoozing seems like a small improvement, there are a ton of benefits. We looked at moving the elephant today. We’ll look at other benefits in the coming posts.