“Even small, repeated actions can create a sense of control in uncertain and stressful situations.” - Angela Duckworth
Rituals create calm confidence when everything else is moving.
Calm enough to keep your best thinking online instead of letting autopilot run the show.
Do you have any?
Grit researchers, Navy SEALs, pro athletes, and every faith tradition know this: routines carry you through uncertainty. That's why you keep coming back to church. Or run through the drills before major game.
Rituals build a small island of control you can stand on while the tide is all over the place.
Good writers know it, too.
Most don’t know how a book ends when they write the first line. But routines take them to the last one.
They show up at the same time, in the same chair, with the same pre-game motions and, one paragraph at a time, the path appears.
Rich Diviney, former commander (drawing on SEALs and neuroscience) offers a simple frame I like to offer in my resilience and stress fitness trainings: DPO.
A way to create calm in the midst of unfolding chaos.
To feel confident and ready, your brain wants to know 3 things:
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Duration — How long will this take?
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Pathway — What steps will I follow?
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Outcome — What does “done” look like? What's the outcome and reward?
The trick in fast, messy times: bring the horizon, the when, closer.
You don’t need the whole book - write the next sentence.
You don’t need the final score - run your warm-up, plan the first pass.
You don’t need the entire transformation plan - take the first, smallest step, test it out.
There is always the next step you know how to take.
When life gets urgent and crowded, our first instinct is to toss rituals. “Who has time?”
And that’s exactly when you need to keep them the most.
Routines aren’t extra; they’re the scaffolding that holds you steady so you can move fast without coming apart.
Doubts will make you choke. Routine will keep your walk steady.
What are your routines, dear reader? The ones that ground you anywhere - in any city, role, or season of life?
If you have none, staying cool in constant change becomes an impossible dream - you stress out, burn out, often check out.
Rituals don’t have to be grand:
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A five-minute walk at sunrise and another at dusk.
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One minute of box-breathing before every meeting.
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A phrase you repeat before an important call or presentation.
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A two-minute “reset” when things don't go as you plan.
Familiarity calms us. Make some on purpose.
Winners have rituals. What are yours?
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“Before I [event], I [action], so I feel [state].”
(Example: “Before I present, I breathe 4-4-4-4 and write my first sentence on a sticky note, so I feel anchored.”)