MM23- Habits

Today I am thankful for:

1. Such magnanimous in-laws
2. Having a steady job
3. The neighbors’ gardens

Past goals:

• Think about and articulate your life purpose. Write it down where you’ll see it every day. 
• Figure out who the best and happiest version of myself is. 
• Go to 1 RR meeting
• Run on all scheduled days

This weeks goals:

1. Develop bedtime routine
2. Write down New Moon and Full Moon rituals
3. Get an adult email address
4. Collect addresses and pre-address envelopes

“Grandma said you didn’t seem like yourself at the funeral.”

“What do you mean?”

“She said you didn’t socialize like you usually do”

It’s amazing, how differently other people see you and you see yourself.

In my head, I am an angry, misanthropic individual who really, would just be happy if left in a Michael’s store alone with regular food delivery.

But the words that other people have used to describe me blow me away sometimes:

Social

Patient

Soft Spoken

Friendly

I had one nurse tell me that she has never heard me raise my voice at work in the one year that she has been working with me. It surprised me. It made me wonder what other misconceptions are out there about me?

Not that I’m complaining– it’s not like any of those words are bad descriptions but completely not in line with how I see myself these days.

I wasn’t always like this either.

As a kid (teenager), I was outgoing, flirtatious, rambunctious. I trusted people and sought out their potential. Every person I met was a story to be told and a lesson to be learned.

All of that was taken away from me in a matter of 3 years. That’s another story for another time. I was angry about it for a long time. I don’t think I am anymore. I am slowly learning to accept this new(er) version of me and work with her and the more I am able to work with her, the more I am able to take back the parts of me that I like.

Ultimately, the goal is to become the person I want to be.

I guess this is why the writing portion of this morning routine has appealed to me so much.

Because I used to LOVE writing. I loved exploring and telling stories. I used to be able to sit for hours and let an entire day pass by me while I wrote on the bathroom floor (my former quiet space) and forgot to eat or drink or rest. It was while I took public transportation everywhere and I would narrate what people were going through. Later, Beezy and I would sit for coffee and make up stories about the people surrounding us.

Sometimes, they made it into my journals and my stories.

I loved creating something out of nothing. I loved these huge worlds into which I could just disappear.

Vacations were often spent reading, tucked away in the woods or at the beach or in the backseat of a car somewhere but also–in Avalon, LA, New Orleans, Thailand, India…and yeah, Middle-earth too. Lots of fantasy…so much fantasy…probably too much fantasy.

For the last decade or so, I haven’t written anything beyond analytical essays and quarterly reports. It wasn’t that it fell away naturally, I just hesitated to do such because the joy and the ability to get lost in a world had become so elusive that I couldn’t write without being overwhelmed with anxiety.

But the person I want to be writes. Maybe she doesn’t write well but she writes often. She records things for posterity’s sake. Because, maybe somewhere down the line…someone is going to read something and be able to relate–have something resonate with them amidst all of the nonsense.

So…I write. I try every day to write.

I’ve been amazed how easy it has been to fall out of the habit though. I didn’t write yesterday. The internet was broken and I got involved in a project at work so I neglected my alloted “goofing off” time for the sake a productivity. I missed day 18 as well.

In the Miracle Morning book– it promises that this week is all about cementing one’s new habits and that a person who has religiously, fanatically followed his suggestions will feel “unstoppable” after day 20. And yet, here I am at Day 23 with only 21 entries in my journal– two of which happened nowhere near the “unbearable” phase but instead, happened around the “unstoppable” one.

That is because there is no proof that it takes 21 days to start/cement a habit!

That whole thing started because a Doctor in the 1950s noticed on average, it took his patients about 21 days to adjust to changes in their physical appearance. Motivational speakers just took it and ran with it.

Because it’s easy to swallow. I mean, 3 weeks? Anyone can do anything for 3 weeks! And then, like magic– suddenly, a person can be that kind of person who runs every day, drinks only water every day or eats only vegetables.

Truth is, a study in 2009 showed that– depending on the person– it can take anywhere between 18- 254 days to change habitual behavior.

254 Day Fix just doesn’t have the same ring to it.

It’s not inspiring, it doesn’t motivate people to get up, get out and develop themselves as a person. As a motivational speaker– I imagine opening with “It only takes a person 254 days to improve themselves!” would not be good for business.

But someone once told me something that totally turned my life around– it was when we first started training for some ridiculously masochistic race or something and I was having an Andy Dwyer moment:

It had to be Sister because Sister is the only one who would tell me something like this:

“You don’t need to stay motivated. You just need to stay disciplined.” 

She then probably dumped a bottle of water on my head and physically kicked me in the butt until I finished running up a death hill or something.

“But Amber!” You’re probably not asking youself but for the sake of continuing this entry, I’m going to pretend you are. “What is all of this talk about making it to Day 30? Isn’t that how long you’re waiting for MM to become habit”

Nope.

I give 30 days to any new thing I bring into my life (except for sobriety, which I gave 90 days because really, the first 30 days are just a person coming out of the fog in a weeping, proverbially shit-stained mess but…another post for another time). 30 days, I figure, gives me a big enough sample to decide whether or not I like this new thing in my life and want to continue to keep it there.

So…with all of that being said.

I just realized that the company christmas party is this Friday and I need to make a metric shit ton of marshmallows. So I hope whoever reads this has a wonderful day and finds the discipline (not motivation) within themselves to keep on keeping on.