🎯 The Practice of Becoming
You don’t become someone new all at once.
Read time: 3.1 minutes
Welcome to Better at Life, the weekly newsletter where I share one simple, actionable idea you can put into practice today to build better habits, sharpen your mindset, and live with more intention.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it actually means to get better at something.
We tend to notice the milestones: the degree, the promotion, the finished project, the goal finally crossed off the list. Those are the moments that are easy to point to and say, “Look, something changed.”
But when I look back at the changes that have mattered most in my own life, very few happened in a single moment.
They happened through practice.
Learning to respond instead of react. Getting a little better at saying no. Protecting time for the people who matter. Recognizing when I’m drifting. Having conversations I might have avoided a few years ago.
None of those things have a finish line.
You just keep practicing.
I call this The Practice of Becoming.
It’s the idea that personal growth isn’t really about arriving at some improved version of yourself. It’s about practicing the behaviors of that person, over and over, until they slowly become part of who you are.
Write this down:
A better life isn’t something you achieve. It’s something you practice.
This Week’s Action
Think about who you were a year ago.
Not what you had accomplished. Think about how you lived.
Ask yourself:
What do I handle differently today?
Maybe you’re more patient. You set better boundaries. You take better care of yourself. You recover from setbacks faster. You’re more willing to have difficult conversations or less concerned with what everyone else thinks.
Now ask:
What did I practice that helped me become this person?
Chances are, the change didn’t happen because of one breakthrough. It happened because you repeated something long enough for it to become part of you.
Then look forward and ask one more question:
What do I want to practice becoming next?
Choose one thing.
Not an outcome.
A way of being.
Why This Works
Goals tend to focus our attention on what we want to accomplish.
Becoming focuses our attention on how we want to live.
There’s an important difference.
You can achieve a goal and immediately start chasing another one. We talked about that in The Finish Line Fallacy.
But there is no finish line for becoming more patient, more present, more courageous, more thoughtful, or more dependable.
Those qualities are practices.
You build them through ordinary decisions, usually when nobody is paying attention.
Try This
Over the past year, we’ve talked about ideas like The Friction Audit, The Invisible Scorecard, The Capacity Trap, The Drift Test, and The Trust Account.
They may look like separate frameworks, but they’re really different ways of practicing the same thing.
Becoming a little better at life.
So this week, don’t ask yourself:
What do I need to accomplish next?
Ask:
Who am I practicing becoming?
Then look at your calendar, your habits, your conversations, and your choices.
They’ll probably tell you the answer.
Weekly Reflection
Before you move on from this email, pause for a moment and ask yourself:
How am I different from the person I was a year ago?
What have I been practicing without realizing it?
Who do I want to practice becoming next?
Write it down, then choose one small way to practice being that person this week.
If this idea feels useful, feel free to pass it along to someone who might need it.
There is no final version of you waiting somewhere in the future. There is only the person you’re practicing becoming through the choices you make today.
I’ve been thinking about that idea more than usual lately.
I’ll tell you why next Sunday.
See you next week — a little better at life.
______
Dr. Chris Mullen
Bring Better at Life to Your Organization
If these ideas resonate, this is also the work I bring into organizations and leadership teams.
I partner with organizations that want clearer thinking, stronger decision-making, and more sustainable performance.
Engagements typically include:
- Keynote speaking for conferences and leadership events
- Leadership development workshops for teams and managers
- Team strategy sessions focused on alignment and execution
For senior leaders seeking deeper application, I also maintain a small executive coaching practice.
