No Day Without A Thought

It's amazing, I just realized that I have this blog for over two years already. However, (and admittedly I am not saying this for the first time), I am not really sticking with the theme "no day without a thought".

However, always when I am starting to get back on track with my life, I am back on the keyboard which I guess rather speaks as a fact for how much in touch I am with myself recently/over a long time.

Today, I just want to keep it simple and list out what a version of an ideal day would look like. Without questioning knowing that there is no 'ideal day' and one shouldn't be too focused on one thing, but open for new things to happen.

(Long) Morning
- be in control of your day when waking up (surroundings, how your room looks, how much time you have, ...)
- decide this will be a good day when waking up, no matter in what mood that is
- make your bed
- if needed, calm the monkey in your mind with morning pages, just write everything down, so you get back the mental space for the day
- meditate
- read
- do sports
- eat the frog = tackle the most important task for the day

By following those steps, the day can't get any bad. I took care of myself and provided my subsconcious with the knowledge how much I value myself and my health, mentally and physically. Plus, I tackled the most important task before heading out and taking on smaller things during the day knowing, the important thing is taken care off.

Throughout the day

- be present/pay attention to what's happening (through meditation, morning pages, ..whatever helps you)
- don't react, have your agenda in mind and be focused
- schedule time for spontaneous things
- be kind and help others achieve their goal
- do sth weird/random/new/slightly uncomfortable
- eat healthy
- take breaks


Evenings

- use your dinners wisely, i.e. meet with friends, call someone from the family, build new relationships
- re run the day
- what was good/what could have gone better
- prep the next day
- no screens, write and read

There are many people with the best intention to set up goals for themselves. The problem most often is that the goal is not well defined.

'I want to loose weight', 'I want to do more sports', 'I want to earn more money', 'I want to get better at ...'

Those goals are all very admirable, usually won't bring you to where you want to go though.

If they are lucky, they have someone who asks them: 'How much do you want to loose?' or 'What's your goal, how much do you want to earn?'

That already helps quite a lot. What in my perspective helps the most is habits. By creating habits you will set the base for achieving whatever you want. When you manage to create a habit to do sports - let's say - 4x per week and eat healthier, chances are that you will achieve your goal to loose weight easily. If you look around in a room and spot the fit people, it comes from a habit of going to sports x times per week. It's not that they have more time, they follow their sports routine religiously.

When you want to be better in finance, spend 30min per day reading finance articles and I am sure you will gain enough knowledge to take on the next challenge, being investing or trading. Obviously in this case it helps to be specific about the topics you are reading.

Habits is what will bring you to the finish line (I don't think there is one, but that is another story). Clarify what and why you want to achieve, then think of a habit to follow this road and make sure to create this habit.

Have you ever found yourself procrastinating?

Chances are high that you have. And that is not a problem itself. Depends on how often that happens and more importantly, why it happens.

This post is supposed to be just a short description of a technique I use to make the step and actual start doing stuff. Let me give you a damn silly personal example I encountered.

When you travel South East Asia, you might notice that 'not every' shower comes with warm water. So, I found myself not only once standing in front of the water coming out of the shower head trying to make my non existing magic work to make it hotter. Obviously that didn't happen. Thus, I ended up standing there for a couple of moments hoping that it won't actually be that cold. It always was.

After many failed attempts, I thought about what other options I have. I didn't come across one. Next, what are actions I can take here? Well, you can go under that water and shower. All you have to do is one step. All you have to do is one step and everything afterwards will happen anyways, whether you like it or not.

There were just no more responsibilities I could take over. When I would make the step, the water would hit my skin and I would get a short shock before my body adapts to the situation - and that will happen automatically, again without any action/responsibility of me. The responsibility part is important. The rest is not on you, or at least not what you have to think about and be overwhelmed by, so you actually start procrastinating again because you freeze by the challenge in front of you.

This is an approach I took over to many other situations. For example running. I have a hard time going for a run while already thinking about the whole time I have to run, about being 'far' away from home and having to run back, about how exhausting it will be and so forth.

Instead, when I focus my mind on just getting started. Just getting on my clothes, shoes and go outside of the house, everything else will follow.

When I have a hard task to fulfill, it's not about focusing on the time, effort and mental or physical energy it might/will evolve, but only about focusing on how you can get started with it. Every other step will fall in place, as soon as the actual process is started. Just take the first step, that's all you have to do.

And sooner than you think, you will be finished. Ok, probably not, but you will have eventually done what you wanted to do and that is great!

Go out. Conquer!