2 minute rule

ayrton senna, arguably the greatest f1 driver of all time. roger federer, THE greatest of all time. bobby fischer, a grandmaster. they all have one thing in common: habit.

forming patterns is integral in human nature. senna could drive round a track if you woke him up in the middle of the night the same way he would’ve if he were wide awake. roger’s game rarely every changes. tick tock. fischer could pull off the greatest chess heists known to mankind with the same opening move.

all seems well and good in the world of seasoned professionals who make even drinking water look like childs play, but why is it so difficult for us 9–5ers and weekend warriors to develop good habits? i mean, there really cant be any drawbacks to chasing perfection, no?

sadly, our surroundings no longer encourage change. 10,000 years ago, man had to actively hunt and gather. probably going days hungry until they found suitable kill. nowadays a few taps and 15 minutes later, doorstep delivery of vile oily cheese on some highly processed baked bread is at your mercy. they call it comfort food but down the line its almost suicidal.

this culture has inhibited the development of good habits. whenever something slightly differs from the norm of ease of access and technology, we find it more difficult to adjust. these tasks seem daunting because we overestimate the work that needs to be done. “oh no, making wudu is so difficult and tedious” “salah is soooo long” “i could never pray the sunnah prayers omds the fardh itself is so difficult” and other lies we tell ourselves. these are very simple tasks with the greatest rewards but yet we skimp at times.

here comes the 2 minute rule. breaking these events into their '2 minute' versions. ‘writing a book’ becomes ‘write a single line’; ‘doing wudu’ becomes ‘wash your hands and face’. this doesnt mean you don’t perform wudu the prescribed way or just writing one single line: it starts a chain of events that lead to one another.

eating the proverbial elephant one bite at a time.