New Years & New Habits

It’s a little over a week since New Year, and I find myself readjusting after some time away with family and friends, and a rather annoying bout of the flu.

I’m not one to put much stock in New Year resolutions – my general approach is that if you want to do something putting it off until an arbitrary date is a good way to not do it – but this year resolutions and what they mean have been on my mind.

Habits

Readers of this blog will have noticed a bit of downtime since my last post. I went away for the holidays, got the flu, and then with traveling and Nut Hunt fulfilling, I’ve been a bit anchorless with the habits that normally keep my days and weeks flowing and productive.

It’s been a little bit of a struggle buckling back down into my normal routine. But, it finally feels like I am settling back in.

I have a lot of things that I am proud of in my life. My relationships with friends and family, building Pine Island and publishing Nut Hunt, and a slew of creative projects over the years including a few unpublished novels.

The past weeks have reminded me how I accomplished most of the things I am proud of – building good habits & consistency.

Breaking it Down

Here’s an example: when I first decided to write a novel (not necessarily a good one (they are unpublished after all)), the task was daunting. How does one even approach putting 80-100 thousand words to paper. Let alone cogent words that create a plot.

Approaching the whole was overwhelming for me. Is overwhelming for me.

An aspect of myself that I have come to understand and work around, is that when a task is overwhelming for me my natural emotional response is avoidance. It becomes increasingly difficult for me to start tackling the task – an emotional wall that is exacerbated by stress.

What gets me through is not focusing on the whole, but rather putting my head down and doing a little bit of work consistently.

If you write 1,000 words a day you’ll have a novel worth of words in a couple of months. That’s kind of amazing.

While it might be a bit harder to conceptualize, the same holds for building anything.

Build a Habit

I’ve been thinking about a year old post from Jamey Stegmaier challenging his readers to create something meaningful to you.

I love the sentiment of his post, and encourage anyone looking for a bit of motivation to check it out. But, I’ve realized that the messaging of his approach (and many approaches I see around New Years) wouldn’t work for me.

They miss a critical step that for me is the difference between day dreaming and concrete action.

So, here is a challenge that I am putting to myself and you my reader: Create a habit towards achieving something fulfilling.

In practice this means picking something you want to get better at or build and then setting aside some time or consistent goals.

Maybe it’s cooking a new dish once a week. Maybe it’s 15 minutes of yoga every morning, or half an hour of reading before bed.

It doesn’t matter what – it’s your journey.

Create a habit and hold yourself accountable, but not too accountable.

I’m excited to see what we can achieve.

What’s a habit that keeps moving towards your goals?