Self Awareness Trumps Data
I just completed my second hot yoga class in the last two weeks with my favorite instructor, Justin. In class today, he said that he doesn’t have space for students to be looking at their smart watches to get data about their body. He went on to say, “as we have aligned on no phones in the room, you shouldn’t be looking at your watches for data.”
I don’t believe he truly understands how powerful and important his message is, as we have become a data obsessed society.
In my 20s, I took up bike riding. My chiropractor at the time told me it would help me with my back issues. I really took to it and enjoyed it a lot for many years. The year I got married, I was riding the most I ever rode weekly, averaging 125-150 miles a week. It was also the lightest I’ve ever been as an adult, weighing 190 pounds. That’s pretty lean for a 6’ 4½” man.
At the time, I had a simple computer on my bike. It reported distance, speed, average speed, time and RPMs (revolutions per minute), which is valuable as RPMs are a great determinate of what gear you should be in, and the reason I got the computer in the first place. I was coached to have a target RPM of 90.
Over time, I realized that I became a slave to the data on the computer. I would push myself physically, just to up my speed or average speed. Many times I completed rides exhausted and I started to realize that biking this way wasn’t fun. One day, I decided to remove the computer from my bike and ride based upon how I felt. If I felt good, I’d ride harder and or longer. If I didn’t feel strong, I would back off and ride fewer miles. The only thing I tracked was time on my bike. This was a huge breakthrough for me and I began to enjoy riding again, no longer feeling obsessed with the numbers on the screen.
The power of this approach became really apparent years later. I have an early season loop ride that I frequently do to start the season. It’s about 13 miles and it would predictably take me 55-58 minutes. One winter, I did hot yoga 1-2 times a week, including doing it seven times in nine days during Christmas break. That spring, I went for my usual first ride of the season and did what I always do, I rode based upon how I felt. Apparently, I felt strong that day. I completed my loop in 44 minutes. For all you data buffs, that is a 20-24% reduction in time. That is simply remarkable, and no computer helped me achieve this result, being connected to my body did, along with the hot yoga of course.
Bikram’s book says that doing hot yoga will help your athletic performance in every other sport. While I believed it I didn’t have any evidence. Now I had real and substantial evidence that what he said is true.
About 10 years ago, I was having health challenges including poor sleep and getting up frequently at night, some nights as many as five or six times. My son had a FitBit watch he wasn’t using, so I started wearing it to track my sleep. After a while the watch broke, so I got another one. Thirteen months later, just out of warranty, my new watch broke. I was annoyed they weren’t going to honor the warranty, so I wrote to the founders looking to have my watch replaced. I never heard from anyone in their office. So like I did with my bike computer, I decided to not replace it and just pay attention to how many times I got up each night and how I felt when I woke up. Was I tired, rested, or energized? This became my feedback.
The good news is I got the medical attention I needed and ultimately I’m down to waking up on average one to two times a night. I still pay attention to how I feel when I awake. If I’m tired, clearly I didn’t sleep well. I don’t need to know how many REM sleep cycles I was in and for how long.
Why do I share all this with you? We have become a data obsessed society. While data is valuable, too much data can be counterproductive or even harmful. If you apply the 80/20 principle to data it would suggest that 20% of the data will make the most significant impact or results we are trying to create. The key is trying to figure out what data is important.
Many of us are looking for information or data that can give us an advantage, personally and at work. That’s why smart watches have become so popular. My experiences however, have taught me that the most important data we can have is self awareness. Unfortunately, self awareness takes time and isn’t aligned with our instant gratification society. It requires introspection, reflection and a willingness to be honest with ourselves.
I know from the axiological assessment I use in my work that most people understand the external world better than they understand themselves. What if that weren’t true for you? What if you understood yourself more than you understood the external world? Would you be more fulfilled? Would you have more joy in your life? Would you be happier? Would you be a better partner, parent, child, sibling, professional? Would you be at peace?
I say yes.
Self awareness is the data we should be seeking. With self awareness we can conquer all life’s challenges.