It’s been quite some time since I’ve posted something on here, and frankly this is a brief post to keep the ball rolling.
The last 120 days have at the same time flown by, yet taken forever, and have been the most personally productive in many areas, ever. This all goes back to the ‘Seriously this is the last cookie’ post.
(Summary is that I tracked the below, and journaled basically every morning/night for 90 days, and ultimately more consistently in the morning)
- Eating (Overall eating for the day)
- Planning (Set plan in AM or Night before)
- Execution (How well the plan was executed)
- Fitness/Working out
- Relationships (Wife, Kids, Family/Friends)
- Overall Feeling
- Journal at Night
- Journal in AM
The only thing focused on for Jan/Feb/March was tracking those metrics, and some amazing things happened. As you can see, it was not highly technical….
The most important was with my relationship to sugar. It sounds funny that this permeated through every other aspect of my life, but tracking the ups and downs of bad eating vs the other metrics it was the common denominator of all of them. When my eating went off the rails, so did everything else.
It all came back to credibility with myself.
For years there was an internal fight of ‘you really should’ vs ‘BUT YOU WONT’… and the ups and downs in all different areas were drastic. I could be insanely disciplined for a couple days, weeks, months (2 max).. then fall completely off. But, for me, this was the trick.
The data was there. It was undeniable seeing that when things are going good, it’s because I was being disciplined.
What did this ultimately lead to?
I haven’t had sugar in 37 days.
And it started on Easter, a day I historically went ‘All in’ on Robbins Eggs at my Aunt Maggies house.. but this year, I was prepared, and it was time to make the change… More on that next time too.
And I’m still tracking the metrics that I decided on, and added a few.
Simply put the 90 days of tracking has become a habit…. But things aren’t perfect by any means.
Tracking and journaling has become a habit, but it’s also become apparent that discipline is needed to break a habit. It’s easier to create bad habits than it is to create good habits. So everyday it an opportunity, to create or maintain habits. It’s also a fight to not create bad habits.
It’s a fight vs the voice that says, be comfortable. Take it easy. You worked out hard yesterday, you can take a day off.. or you can let up and go easier. You can have the cookie.. this is the last one…
So now I’m onto the day of watching my 4 sons this AM, while my amazing wife works, then coaching a track meet for 7+ hours today.
Was not letting this site get away from me.
If there’s any area of your life you’re looking to improve, just track it. Don’t worry about making big changes, just try this technique and make yourself mindful of whats happening, at least for 2 minutes a day.
Don’t be hard on yourself for bad days, or think everything is great on good days, just look at the numbers after every 2 weeks and see what stands out.
To your success.