doing better, feeling worse

when better habits don't lead to better days

I’ve worked really hard to improve my morning routine. I want it to set the tone for the day. I want it to set the foundation for my health and wellness. I want it to be a platform for my energy and intent.

Every day, I feel the progress and the improvement that I’ve made.

I feel it when I sense my breath washing over my body and my brain slowly releasing its tight, clenched grip during pranayam. I feel it when I sense my muscles stretch, tighten, and then slowly release during yoga. I feel it when I sense the quiet intensity behind my eyes as I begin to attack the day.

But that’s not all I sense as I work my way through my morning practices.

“I should’ve gotten started sooner,” I tell myself even before setting my yoga mat.

“I’m not finding a deep release or greater presence; I must be doing something wrong,” I tell myself as I try to return my focus to my breath.

“Why am I not able to perform this movement the way it’s supposed to be done?” I ask myself as I fight, tremble, and shake through my poses.

“Why am I not as focused and energized as I expected to be?” I question as I try to summon the clarity and intent to make progress on my work.

The true story of my mornings is that they’re defined by tension; the tension between my wish to relax and start my day with ease and the quiet but persistent pressure to keep getting better at everything I’m doing. They’re filled with “better” habits, sure, but the disappointing reality is that my experience hasn’t changed much.

So what has truly changed? Why has doing better not meant experiencing better?

To start to answer those questions, let’s consider the following idea:

Maybe the answer begins with a strange idea: we are always a perfect and honest expression of our belief systems.

This means that belief and action are not separate. They’re like the shape and shadow of the same object, forming a single self-reinforcing entity that manifests itself across space through actions and consciousness through thoughts.

We get stuck when we try to alter our thoughts or actions without engaging with the underlying schema that produces them. That’s why New Year’s Resolutions rarely stick; it’s like planting new seeds in toxic soil. The beliefs are still there, underground, waiting to choke out anything new. We’re engaging with ourselves at the wrong level.

In my case, it wasn’t my routine that was off. It was my relationship with my mornings that was causing persistent tension. It was the silent belief that I’m only okay if I’m constantly improving and optimizing.

Even in moments of stillness, I could feel a part of me hovering above, scanning, scoring, judging. I wasn’t just doing yoga; I was being watched doing yoga. And I hated that I couldn’t turn the watcher off.

The only way my mornings improved was by dissolving the underlying schema by changing my relationship with what I do. Instead of asking myself, “What should I do?” I started to ask myself, “What would feel nice right now?”, treating my mornings as an invitation instead of an expectation. Slowly but surely, the tension started to fade away.

It’s not difficult to spot this loop everywhere. The person who stops drinking but starts obsessively exercising. The billionaire still desperately clawing for more. The behavior shifts, but the loop stays intact. Belief regenerating action, action reinforcing belief.

Lasting change, I’m realizing, begins not with what I do but with what I believe. Until that shifts, most experiences just repeat themselves in different clothing. When your beliefs shift, your responses shift. You find yourself meeting old situations with new presence; not because you forced it, but because something inside you changed. The old habits seem like a distant memory that might as well have belonged to someone else. Completely unintelligible, like rewatching an old film and realizing you no longer empathize with the main character. You know the plot, but the feeling is gone.

But maybe we don’t need belief systems at all. Maybe life doesn’t need to be constructed or optimized and just lived, felt, and met as it comes. My morning would shift from a container of self-performance into an endless frontier where my curiosity and natural inclination lead, unoptimized and unjudged. A space for a different kind of peace, joy, and excitement. A space where I have the freedom to finally listen; not for an instruction, but for what already wishes to move through me. A space where I can let go and release.