Seven Little Things that Make the Most Difference in my Life

I admit to being a bit of a productivity nerd, always reading new books and trying to get some new hack that will actually help me get more stuff done. One recent book suggested a four step process...

First - focus on one Highlight for your day - something that you've wanted/needed or would like to work on - and schedule a 60-90 min chunk of time for that.

Second - when that time comes around, practice Laser focus - turn off your phone, etc - just work on your Highlight.

Third - Reflect on how it all went and repeat.

Except... it is a 4-step process and there's a supporting step that is not part of the work flow... Energize. Basically, you need to keep up your energy otherwise your day is going to tank. They have several ideas for how to energize yourself during the day - everything from snacking to strategic caffeine to naps to good sleep hygiene.

And I thought... yes... this is all so true. I know this soooooo well!!!

1. Prioritize Sleep

I have not been sleeping well lately. I have trouble falling asleep and then I wake up at 3 am. Sometimes I lie there, awake, until it's time to get up at 5 or 5:30. I know that these sleep issues are due to multiple things... watching a movie too late into the evening, being on my phone or the computer in the evening, the cat chirping in my ear and demanding cuddles at 3 am, my partner having coughing fits (allergies)... it really doesn't matter. The upshot is... I drag myself out of bed at 5:30 am and feel horrible.

When I have not slept well, my energy is blipping along at almost 0%. I have no enthusiasm for my projects. I spend my day putting out tiny fires (extremely urgent to me) and start neglecting other things, like eating well.

So I'm focusing on good sleep hygiene as we move into this new year. No TV or computers or phone after 7 pm. I can work on a puzzle, or we can play a game. Maybe I'll write some cards. Any analogue activity is fine... just nothing digital. I'm also starting to have a mug of chamomile tea in the evenings. We have also begun to listen to a sleep meditation just before bed. We could try banishing the cat from the bedroom but that isn't going to happen. 

2. Eat Good Food

I get up early, and head off to Starbucks most mornings. I come home around 8 am and then make breakfast. But... if I go grocery shopping... then the morning gets longer and I might not get home till 9 am or later. At which point I am a raging Hangry (hungry anger). I do try to take a breakfast-on-the-go with me - some yogurt and berries, or a cut-up apple. Because, honestly... if I am running around doing errands... the hangry really wants something... and there is Timmies (toasted bagel with herb and garlic cream cheese) or Starbucks (chocolate brownie warmed-up). And neither of those options is good for me. 

So... we are back to Michael Pollard's book (In Defense of Food). The take-away was... Eat Food. Not too Much. Mostly Plants. We do try to follow that. Where I get hung up is on snacks...  I want chocolate! No.... that's not right. I NEED chocolate!!

I have been trying to grab an apple and almonds when the urge strikes... trying to wean myself off of the chocolate. I've also decided to give dark chocolate a try... REAL dark chocolate. My brother-in-law has done this in the past. And when I've visited them, I've tried a piece of  90% dark and almost spit it out!! Soooo bitter and dry and... ick! But... it's an acquired taste. More on this in next week's blog...

3. Drink Water

Ugh. I totally fall down on this. Years ago, a friend (10 years older than me) told me that if she didn't drink enough water, she would get tired and cranky. Yeah-yeah... whatever.

Ah-hem...

It's true. For me! Ugh. I walk by my water bottle in the morning as I head out the door and I think "There it is. I should pick it up. But it's empty. It will take too much time to take it to the sink and fill it with water."

No. Seriously. This went through my head just this morning. The rest of me looks on in amused incredulity... "It would take 10 seconds to fill that water bottle up!" Yeah, whatever. Now I'm at the bottom of the stairs and it would take even LONGER now.

So I head out the door without a water bottle. And regret it later when I am grocery shopping and parched. Yep. Got bit in the ass by my own impatience.

The thing to do is this... maybe... to park downhill. I wrote about this ages ago. Grease the wheels, smooth the trail... park downhill. The thing to do would be to fill my water bottles the night before (I have several). Fill the small one and put it in my office back-pack... the one that I take with me when I head out. Would that not be the thing to do? Yes... it would... wish me luck!

4. Move More, Sit Less

I have one of those fancy Garmin watches that tell me how many steps I've taken, etc. If I sit too long, it will vibrate on my wrist and if I look at the screen, it tells me to "MOVE!". It's a bossy little thing, that watch. Of course, I ignore it.

I already do a 45-60 min pre-lunch walk with my partner. That's good, right? Yep. And more is always better. We are starting to stitch in a pre-dinner walk - just around the neighbourhood. Usually it's because one, or both, of us have not yet reached 10,000 steps. It's a good little incentive and we also visit the mailbox and check if the free newspaper is out yet.

Moving is always good... I need to remember that.

5. Meditate & Breathe

I fell off the meditation bandwagon months ago. To just stop, breathe, focus on nothing but the breath and watch the monkey mind scurry around. Come back to the breath.

When I do meditation, I always feel so much better. I am calmer, clearer... just... better. Why do I not do it? Because it takes too much time. Yep... I mean... if 10 seconds is "too much time", then a 5 minute meditation session is so over-the top "too much time", it doesn't even bear thinking about.

Although, my partner reminded me that... "you can meditate at any time... not just in the morning"... errrr... you mean, instead of being on my phone and scrolling the news?? Whhhhaaaaattttt?? Yeah. What a concept.

What if... when I pick up my phone because I'm bored or avoiding something... I actually stopped and closed my eyes and meditated for a quick minute or two or three... What would happen?

Hmmm... idea percolating here. I could change my lock screen to be a pic that says... Meditate & Feel Better... 

*20 minutes later**

Done!! We'll see if it makes a difference or just becomes part of the scenery...

And... I've also set a timer on the two worst time-sucks on my phone (my boredom soothers) - Facebook app and the Internet app (for checking the news). When the daily time limit is reached... boop... the app is greyed out and I can't click it open!

6. More Analog Face Time - Less Digital Facetime

No, this is not Apple's Facetime... which is not actual face time. I'm talking real, live, analog face time... where you sit down in front of a real person and have a chat or play a game or... whatever. We are social beings. We need inter-personal interactions! And as we all learned during Covid... Zoom calls gave us LOTS of Facetime and interactions but very little face time... and we all felt exhausted after those calls. Digital Facetime is no substitute for analog face time.

Maybe that's why I like sitting in Starbucks and working. I see a lot of real people. I hear murmured conversations. I chat with some of my Starbucks regulars, chat with the baristas... it doesn't take much.

7. Get Outside

This one is huge. To just get outside, breathe some fresh air and interact with nature. Even if it's just in the backyard. Better if it's a walk in the forest. Being out in the forest calms me... energizes me... Soooo... just get outside.

A Plan for the New Year

Yep, it's January 1. A time when a lot of us make the dreaded New Year's Resolutions... Usually they are lofty goals "I am going to go to the gym every day and work out for an hour!". How'd that work for you? They've done studies, and most resolutions are on the trash heap by the time February rolls around.

I'm going to start small... with small steps... chamomile tea at night, dark chocolate and an apple in my office bag, pre-fill my water bottle at night, walk to the mailbox (don't drive), meditate for 5 minutes, play a game, get outside and breathe.

Small steps can make a big difference.

Why New Year's Resolutions Fail and What to do Instead

Right then, hands up all of you... er... us... who have made New Year's resolutions. OK, great... now, hands up for those of us who have fallen flat on our faces by the end of January? Yup... me too. It's inevitable in a way. The New Year rolls around, all fresh and bright and shiny and we think... THIS is the year! And we make a long list of everything that we are going to change this year: lose weight, exercise more, learn to play that dusty guitar in the corner, become fluent in Spanish, start an Emergency Fund, etc. We make these resolutions and resolve to do them, come flood or high water!

Truth is, that shiny new year is weighed down by a sack of expectations before it's even one day old. No wonder that we fail... and yet next year... we try again. I do believe someone had a quote which defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again but expecting a different result.

The thing is, our amazing brain likes to streamline a lot of its work. It doesn't like to have to make decisions on what to do for all sorts of little micro actions, particularly if they are repeated time after time.

For example, driving a car. When we're first learning to drive a car, it's a huge brain drain. Every little action is new and different and we need to pay attention and think things through. But... drive a car for a few decades and these routines just run in the background without a lot of conscious thought. It's how we can get from home to the grocery store and realize we daydreamed the entire way! Of course, if something out of the ordinary happens, the brain kicks in again and we hopefully avoid the deer running across the street.

This brain routine thing can be a good thing... or a bad thing. Sometime when we were kids (or maybe when I was a kid), we'd sit in front of the TV and have a little snack before bed. Repeat that enough times and... now, as an adult, I sit in front of TV and I want a little snack. In some ways, we're no better off than poor Pavlov's dog. Ring the bell and salivate. Turn on the TV and salivate. So these brain routines aren't necessarily good for us... they're just the brain's way of making it's job a lot easier. "Oh yeah, TV's on... time for a snack!"

So, along comes the New Year and we think... right then... enough of that snacking in front of the TV. I am NOT going to snack. It works for maybe a few days or a week and then I've had a crappy day with the Zoom call or whatever and... it's snack time in front of the TV. And... well... once I've snacked one day in front of the TV, it's no biggie to just snack again the next day... and maybe the next day. I can always restart this no snacking thing on February 1. Yeah. Right.

There's a few of things going on here. First is that the brain loves routine... and once a routine has been programmed, it can kick in again days, weeks or months later. Sooo... that one snack night in mid-January ends up continuing for weeks. Second is that nature (and our brain) abhors a vacuum. It doesn't work to just take something away. Or to say "No" to something. Our brains are like... "Wait, what?" and it gets all twitchy because it keeps wanting to run the TV=Snack Time routine. Which explains why we often cave and eat the whole box of Merci chocolates in one go. I should know. sigh. Third is that we have a limited amount of decision-making capacity. So if, as we sit in front of the TV, our brain keeps saying "TV=Snack" and we keep making the decision to say "No"... eventually our "No's" are going to be worn down by the brain's never-ending attempt to run it's little routine.

But... there is help. Our brain programs can be rewritten but it's likely going to take small steps. Instead of relying on willpower and decision-making capacity, which is limited, we set up new habits. Like I said, our brain loves routines and habits are just routines. But habits don't just burst out of our brains fully formed in all their lovely glory. Nope... remember... small steps.

I'm a morning person. I like to get up early and it seems like a perfect time to go for a quick walk, just to get the blood flowing. In the summer, when it's light out and the sun is shining, this is not too challenging. In the winter, when it's dark and the rain is pouring down... good luck with that. If I lie in bed and have think and make a decision about whether or not I am going to go for my walk today... the walk will lose every time.

So, I started small. I'll just get dressed in my walk clothes. And once that's done... I'll go put on my walking shoes and coat. And then I'll just walk to the end of the driveway. Usually, once I'm out there, I'll go farther of course, "Cause, I'm already out here and it's not so bad." After weeks and months of this, it's now second nature... habit... for me to get up in the morning, get dressed and all kitted up in my rain gear and go out for a walk. I don't to have to think about it... it's just what I do in the mornings. It's a full-fledged habit. But... it took a while to get there.

I've also tried to make it a bit more "fun" by downloading audio books from the library and listening to a book as I'm trudging up the Beast Hill with the rain dripping down my face. It distracts me from that little internal voice that still yammers at me... "Do we really want to go up the Beast today? It's going to be sooo hard! And we're going to find out what a winter slug we have become!" But I can't listen to the audio book AND listen to that voice... otherwise I'll miss what's going on the in the book... so I just focus on the book and my brain/body work together to get me walking up the hill. It's when I start to think about it that things can go sideways and I end up just doing a quick walk around the block. The thing is... afterwards, I never regret going out in the pouring rain and slogging up the Beast. I feel good about myself!

Sooo... did I do New Year's Resolutions this year? Kind of. I set some goals for myself, ambitious goals I think, but I've also got a plan of small steps to get there. I'm tying them together with other well-formed habits, a practice called habit-stacking. After lunch, for example, I'm going to sit down at my computer and open a project file I've been working on (well... actually, I've not been working on it... but I want to be working on it!). I plan to work on it for a minimum of 15 minutes. And then we'll see where it goes from there. One of my biggest hurdles is getting started on things but even I can do something for 15 minutes. Odds are, once I'm into it, I'll work on it for a lot longer but... small steps...

As for the TV=Snacking routine/habit... I could do something else and not watch TV (what a thought). Do a puzzle. Genealogy data entry. Read a book. Play a virtual game of Skip-Bo with my Mom. The possibilities are endless. And once the cue (TV) is out of the picture... then the entire routine collapses. As long as I don't start snacking while doing the puzzle.

If I'm dead-set on watching TV, I could have a bowl of fruit on the coffee table, ready to be snacked on. Better than a whole box of chocolates. Speaking of which... I try not to keep chocolates in the house. Cause if they're here... I'll eat them. But it's not a complete vacuum... because I know that if the chocolate munchies strike, I can always walk down to the corner store and buy them. Strangely enough, however, that little bit of extra effort is enough of a kinetic barrier to stop the chocolate craving in its tracks.

There's a tonne of info out there on how to form habits. I recently read James Clear's book, Atomic Habits, which I highly recommend. Another book by Charle Duhigg, The Power of Habit, is also excellent. Maybe in the future, instead of making New Year's resolutions... we'll commit to forming some new habits for the New Year. And they all start with small steps.