THE ROOT 9: 21.2

Not Just “Why?”, but “Why?” 5x

This week, I've been thinking about the power of asking "why". Not just once…but multiple times.

I had the chance to practice this over the weekend and it really opened my eyes to how much deeper we can go, even when we think our initial "why" is already a deep dive. The exercise involved answering a self-reflective question, then answering the "why" to our answer. After a mental reset on a different topic, we'd answer "why" again. We repeated this for five total "whys." At first, I was editing my first "why". By the end, I had changed almost all of the original language for something that felt more raw.

I think this practice can be extended into our daily lives. Whether it's to better understand why you might be reacting or feeling a certain way about a situation or to extend grace to another person. You might feel irritated by how you responded to a situation / person…but if you keep asking yourself "why," maybe the root cause of your response wasn’t even related to the situation / person's actions at all. Or if you really enjoyed doing something, continuing to ask "why" may help you understand what about it you truly enjoyed. Maybe it was a deeper set of feelings that specific activity provoked you are craving?

Applying this to others, by silently asking ourselves "why" to better understand people and their motivations, we can treat them with more grace and potentially connect on a deeper level.

I'm going to try and practice asking myself "why" more than once, giving myself the freedom to see the answer evolve. Let me know if you give it a shot 🙂

Body Doubling For Focus

I didn’t know this until recently, but I’ve been body doubling subconsciously with friends or Dylan since COVID, when we would hop on a zoom, mute ourselves, and just exist while working together to be productive but still connected. Turns out, this practice is called ‘body doubling’ and pretty popular.

There is some neat science behind it, it works by activating your mirror neurons. These are the same neurons that kick in during something like the fake laughing exercise you might have done in a summer camp. One person typically starts fake laughing, then another, and eventually, everyone's genuinely laughing. When you see someone else performing a task, your mirror neurons get stimulated, making it easier for you to start a similar task yourself.

For me, it’s incredibly useful if I’m struggling to start a task that's difficult to focus on or one that feels overwhelming or requires focus for a prolonged period of time. The more similar the task your "body double" is doing, the easier it is to mirror their productivity. If you’re both working on essays, for example, you're more likely to get into your own writing groove.

FocusMate was born off of this technique. It’s in the name, it’s meant to give you a mate to help you focus. The neat thing is that your ‘body double’ is a stranger, so it’s less likely you would get caught up in chatting and not actually working.

FocusMate is an online platform that connects you with other people who want to be accountable for their work. You book a session, get matched with another member, join a video call, and share your goals. Then you mute yourselves and work. At the end, you check in and (hopefully) celebrate your progress. Check it out if you are curious 🙂

I body double all the time. It helps me stay off my phone and focused. Let me know if you give it a shot (or if you want to body double together 🙂 )

I’ve talked about this a bit, but post 75 Hard, I’ve struggled with being motivated to drink water. I’m not kidding, I am carrying Pedialyte or Mio everywhere to jazz up the flavor of water. In the first few weeks post 75 Hard, my antipathy (that sounds harsh, but honestly a bit true) to water was pretty strong.

I’ve been loving the Lemon Perfect. waters recently. Grab one if you see one 🙂