Do you ever use a habit tracker? — some type of visual way to mark your daily, weekly or monthly progress when you’re trying to start a new habit? The one I use now is a weekly desk planner, but I’ve also used Post-Its and pieces of paper in a notebook.
I’ve seen daily habit tracker stamps (there are a bunch on Etsy) that also look cool.
I started regularly using my current habit tracker back in January, and I’m definitely a believer. I use it daily, and it’s surprisingly effective. It really helps to be able to see my progress at a glance, and it’s oddly satisfying to fill a square every day.
Of course, tracking is only one piece of the habit-building puzzle. I’ve also learned, and maybe this is just me, but I’ve figured out that habit-building is like building up a muscle… You start with the lightest weight, and build up.
In the beginning, start with something easy to accomplish and incorporate into your life, like spending five minutes each day on your new habit (or 10 minutes tops). Because if I try to bite off much more than that, even when I’m totally fired up about something and really, really want to commit to spending an hour on it every day, I resist the urge because new goals can quickly get overwhelming, so I force myself rein it in.
Right now for me it’s spending five minutes on meditation and gratitude every morning. Five minutes is all I have to do, and then I’m done. (But if I want to keep going, I’m allowed. I just don’t have to. Anything beyond five minutes is gravy.)
When I’m done, I tick off a square in my habit tracker.
The second piece of the puzzle is the reward. ? You don’t have to go crazy and spend $$$ every time you tick a square (this is not an excuse to blow your budget!), but whatever your reward is, you should recognize your good work. Give yourself a pat on the back for sticking to this.
I like to treat myself to a bottle of nail polish or a movie rental on iTunes (this week it was Knives Out! SO GOOD), but whatever you do, DO NOT forget the reward. The reward is key.
If you want to make a life change or just start a new habit, give habit trackers a try. They’re a great way to chart your progress and cheer yourself along. ?
Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,
Karen
I see Connor has added her goals as well. ?
This is a really great idea. I don’t have a journal like this but I do have graph paper and when I’m feeling really productive I’ll create my own little chart with it. This is a good reminder to get back into it! It really helped me with my fitness goals seeing all the days laid out together. ??
Congrats on your goals!
I have Knives Out on a netflix DVD at home. I plan to watch on Friday! 🙂
I’m glad the habit tracking has been a success for you! It seems like a great tool for organized, goal-oriented people. I do a lot of planning, tracking and analyzing results at work and for some other organizations (and practically live on excel) so I like to take a break from that during my free time. However, I’m sure the tracking would be helpful to tons of people. Luckily my most recent goal has an easy visual of its own (holy cow, I just cleaned in here and it’s a mess again!). I’ve made my goal the whole family’s goal. They’re loving it. HAHA!