I was putting some new habits in place to try and bring more energy and discipline to 2024. How’s that all going?
Previously, I explained how I wanted to start some new habits to make 2024-me better. The top habits – the easy ones with the most impact – were:
- Eat well
- Exercise
- Floss
- Declutter
But there were others that should have been do-able too:
- Clean/tidy/fix up our house properly
- Stop going to bed late
- Read more books
- Write more
And the things I wanted to do, but that really had to give way because they were harder and lower value:
- Work on side projects… 😕
Well, I’m just about recovered from Covid, which hasn’t helped matters. It’s basically written off the last week, and February will be a clean start. But let’s look at how it’s gone.
I’m tracking in the excellent TickTick app (which I plan to write about sometime) and it lets me export a nice little graphic of my month.
Clarifications on some of the habits
Just to clarify some of these, because their wording in some cases doesn’t really say what they are:
- “Quit snacks” is pretty self-explanatory, but I’m basically calorie tracking with the Lose It app, and this is me hitting my goal there.
- “Do housework” makes is sound like I don’t normally do any. Which is not true. The idea of this is that I will do a significant piece of housework OR a DIY job on the house/garden/car _before_ I sit and have “me time” in the evening. It’s about doing things in the right order (rather than playing Zelda for two hours and then rushing to get the dishes done before I go to bed).
- “Early to bed” actually means not starting doing anything new after 10:30pm. I still may not be asleep until quite late. But it’s the cut off for new things that’s important.
How’s it going then?
- Plan your day: Started well, but have dropped off. This ALWAYS happens. Need to nail it because it’s SO useful.
- Quit snacks: Was doing so well and losing some weight and was proud of myself. Then events and illness happened. A fresh start in February. Let’s do better!!
- Mini workouts: Again, started strong, but succumbed to events. Need to find ways to not let events get in the way here. Should be doable.
- Do housework: Not sure what happened in that middle week. But I recovered before Covid struck. This is good!
- Reading: This is was lower importance, but has clearly been easy to do. I’ve even finished two books!
- Early to bed: Excellent. Skipped a few nights. Because sometimes I just want to pause and do something fun or interesting. But generally good here!
- Flossing: Excellent. I am now a “person who flosses”. My dentist will be proud!
- Declutter: Very poor. This is really interesting. BUT… given how well I’m doing with the others I’m not going to beat myself up about it. Call this a stretch goal.
- Exercise: The goal here is actually 5 days a week of either cycling to my office, or doing some other “proper” exercise. So I’m actually doing pretty well. Again – Covid stopped me in my tracks. But I should be able to get this one back on the go.
Summary
Overall, I’m REALLY happy. It’s supposed to be hard to work on multiple habits, and I’ve done it pretty well. I’m really pleased.
Covid did really mess things up though. It’s Monday tomorrow. A new week. Let’s see how we get on as we reset and start a new month!
How are your goals or resolutions going?