You’re back for a third time!? No way. Thank YOU for being here again! Let’s get into it!
It doesn’t pay off as much as we would like to only work on something for a day or two, or even a week sometimes. If there is something that you truly feel you need to alter, it is something you are going to have to pick up, until it becomes engraved, and you form a habit. I have been really interested in habits recently because I have a couple rather negative habits that I am VERY interested in breaking. Some are things that others have told me I do, some are things I notice I do. Some are as simple as what I want my mornings to look like, writing more, or reading more. Some others look like healthy eating and exercising. Then there is comparing myself to others and negative self talk that take a lot of work and deep dive into self to break.
The key word through breaking or creating any sort of habit is CONSISTENCY. So I started a habit tracker. My habit tracker is a little chart that has every day of the month with a box below it and the habits I want to focus on next to it. That way I can go through each day and check off which habits I successfully completed. I find that instead of writing, for example, “Not comparing myself to anyone” I write the habit I want to pick up instead. This allows me to actually substitute the negative with a positive, healthy habit. Another example is “Not watching Netflix at ___ time” to substituting it for “picking up a book and reading it at ___ time”. Already it’s an easier shift because you’re saying you are doing the actual healthy habit instead of saying “don’t”. Substituting a positive word for a negative is really helpful.
Comparing myself is something I have struggled with a lot. I didn’t realize exactly how much so but I do so it’s going on the habit tracker! I added two positive habits, because when you compare yourself to someone you are typically comparing their wins to your “behind the scenes”. If something good happens to someone, in that moment I am comparing their best moment to my moment happening then. It could be bad, it could be normal, daily life, but I am just seeing that at that moment this person got something really good and I did not. (Wow ego much, I know I’m working on it) Comparing someone’s highlight to my not so best moment, is unfair for any party involved. One of the habits I want to start implementing is to reflect upon my own wins at the end of the day. No matter how big or small. It could be something so small as drinking enough water, or getting out of bed, or taking time for a couple of good big breaths. That counts. Write them down, and give myself a pat on the back. The other habit is when someone gets a win, celebrate them solely, without any sort of commentary from my brain and shower them in all of the praise, love and goodness that they so deserve. Letting them know that I am proud of them and that they can even do bigger and better things. It’s unfair for them to receive anything else. This way, people I care about are receiving proper accolades for their amazing work and I am also getting celebrated at the end of my day too for all of the things I have accomplished.
Don’t get me wrong, I will of course fall off track. We’re only human! Everyone is bound to have flops. Don’t get discouraged. It’s okay, everyone has days! Be gentle with yourself. If you have a day where you fall off, instead of starting from square one at the beginning again, take a breath and say today was a day, I recognize this, I’m going to keep going because I am going to get this! (Because you will, duh! :) ) Don’t make yourself stuck in a negative cycle when you deserve so much more, ESPECIALLY with negative self talk.
Another helpful tip is knowing yourself and figuring out where you could go wrong. Me, I love clean slates, new projects and blank notebooks. Fresh starts. I get easily excited by different things and have a hard time following through on something I really really care about, because I get distracted by something else MORE new. Knowing this about myself and going into a period where habit wise, I decided I will be working on only three habits for a prolonged period of time, I can trick my brain into thinking that every day is new! It doesn’t have to be the beginning of a week or a month or starting a new habit to feel new. Know how you talk to yourself and know what works for you. Not everyone is the same. Do you work better in a group? Do you need an accountability partner to check in on you? Do you work better alone, writing and reflecting? Make your brain work for YOU, don’t give in and work for your brain. Be consistent with it. With any sort of habit you have to keep consistent.
I’m a huge procrastinator, I am dream really big. Sometimes when it comes to day to day I think of all the things I want and neglect that one thing that could actually push me. When I was first starting out with habits, I was looking at ten habits at once. Saying I wanted to meditate, but also exercise daily but also eat really healthy and also write and read. All things that I was and am fully capable of doing BUT if I put all of them down and expect that at the end of the month, everyday I had done all of those, it’s just not realistic. It got incredibly exhausting and overwhelming.
Pick three things that are really important to you. Stick to those three things for three months (or whatever timeline works best for you). If you fall off the bandwagon, that is totally okay, pick yourself up and keep going, tomorrow is another day! And of course, celebrate you because this is HARD. WORK.
My three habits are going to be writing daily when I wake up, recognizing my wins at the end of the day, and solely celebrating other people’s wins when opportunities come along for them and showering them with how proud I am, no comparisons or commentary.
What are some habits you are interested in working on? Would love to hear! Enjoy the rest of your week. Xox
-O
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