It has been a good couple of years for me. I am extremely thankful and happy for what I have and how far I have come. Sadly the blog hasn’t seen much during this time and hopefully I will work on it better this year. I don’t have a new year resolution to post X number of posts or any such thing. But I do have a framework of what I want to do this year. My one keyword for this year is going to be HABITS. I plan to work on creating a quite a few good habits or get rid of a few bad ones over the entirety of this year. The idea is to focus on one habit every month and stay disciplined to create that habit at the end of the month. Most of these are going to be about small minor wins to be had on a daily basis.
This month I am going to try to Read at least a page of book first thing in the morning, every day of January.
Photo credits teestassi.
A daily walk. For many, a regular daily walk was essential to brain functioning. Soren Kierkegaard found his constitutionals so inspiring that he would often rush back to his desk and resume writing, still wearing his hat and carrying his walking stick or umbrella. Charles Dickens famously took three-hour walks every afternoon — and what he observed on them fed directly into his writing. Tchaikovsky made do with a two-hour walk, but wouldn’t return a moment early, convinced that cheating himself of the full 120 minutes would make him ill. Beethoven took lengthy strolls after lunch, carrying a pencil and paper with him in case inspiration struck. Erik Satie did the same on his long strolls from Paris to the working class suburb where he lived, stopping under streetlamps to jot down notions that arose on his journey; it’s rumored that when those lamps were turned off during the war years, his productivity declined too.
Not just geniuses, most people even half a century ago had routines and they were defined by their daily routines. Just recollect how your grandparents lived their life with routines. Their character and traits were defined by their habits. Its nothing new that our habits define who we are, where we end up. Having some routine that helps us accomplish our long term goals is definitely a no brainer. A Simple habit that adds value to a long term goal is the best way to start with habits if you don’t have a routine.
Focus on Writing
If there is one behavior that would change my life by leaps and bounds would be to stop procrastinating. I procrastinate a lot and I probably would put any procrastination scale to shame. As a hobbyist blogger, I procrastinate in that role as well, and that’s exactly why Posts are so infrequent, while a list of To Write keeps growing on iCloud. Staying on the topic of procrastination, Leo Babuta has an excellent post here to help for writers. I have it linked here as more of a reminder to me while sharing the tips.