New Year…… Struggling Me!

“Those times when you get up early and you work hard….those times when you stay up late and you work hard….Those times when you don’t feel like working and you’re too tired and you don’t want to push yourself but you do it anyway! That is the dream, it is not the destination, IT IS THE JOURNEY.” — Kobe Bryant

Happy New Year! Yes, It’s already been thirty-one days of 2024! Congratulations to you for making it through the “365” days in January! The longest month of the year, the only month you remember, and before you know it, you are in December 2024!

New Year, New Me!

Richmond’s Habit Tracker Sheet

Above is my traditional habit-tracker which I love to print and keep as a hard copy because I am very old school. After reading Atomic Habits by James Clear about setting up systems, I evaluated my goals and asked myself what kind of systems will always move me closer to my set goals at the end of every day, week, month, and year. I wrote a similar article on this three years ago (Link here). I stopped counting how many books I read and rather started focusing on how much time I commit to reading every day, week, and year. Over time, this helped me read more and thus achieve more. This is just a context into my daily routine.

I set up systems that I believe move me one step closer to my goals every day.

I know! I started planning 2024 in October 2023 and here I am, looking at my “productive self and improved self” struggling to hit my goals for January 2024. It has been a rough start, last year I had five things I was trying to habituate to become the “best” version of me. I tried my best. Guess what, this year I decided to add two more things to make it 7. That’s my ideal self aiming for perfection and battling with my real self and scoring 0/7 consistently for 21 days in January! (see the irony, 7 * 3 = 21) Three perfect weeks of imperfection!

Richmond’s Habit Tracker For The First 22 Days Of January

I was speaking with my friend Vanessa and she told me how she had made up her mind to start the year in February because January did not January. I wanted to agree with her but I said to myself, “Half a loaf is better than none”, so I decided to take the remaining days quite seriously. I did not attain a 7 immediately, but I tried. As you can see from my score sheet, I moved incrementally from 1/7 to, 2/7 to 4/7 and had some cool 6/7 appearing once! This is me who almost gave up in January!

Progress Happening On My Habit Tracker

Moving away from the scores, I use scores to “rate” myself each day as I am trying to set up systems to help me achieve my goals. For example, I am working on a consistent sleep schedule and wake-up schedule (that’s already 2) and a time for reading and studying each day (that’s four). The goal is, if I can show up for these tiny things, I automatically propel myself into doing things that push me to my desired objectives.

Why a sleep and wake-up schedule?

I have read articles on how having a consistent sleep time and wakeup time leads to increased productivity and I want to try it out in 2024 and see for myself if my overall productivity increases. These two additions make my daily habits now 7.

Overview Of My Daily Habits

1. Wake up on or before 5 AM: #Team joining the 5 AM Club!
2. Quiet Time: #Team prayer & meditation for solid spiritual & mental foundation.
3. Exercise: #Team pushups, or gym daily for a healthy body! (I intend to do pushups if I don’t go to the gym.)
4. Read: #Team expand your knowledge by reading more.
5. Study: #Team set aside time for career progression.
6. L’examen: #Team evening introspection and reflection.
7. Sleep at 11 pm: #Team early to bed, early to rise.

C’est clear? Oui? Non? Okay. I am sure you do, if not, schedule a mentorship session with me. (just kidding.. read Atomic Habits by James Clear)

Anyway, I am writing this article because:

1. I want to write again in 2024.
2. I want to share that January has not been January and “New Year New Me” is falling into water..that is why I named the article “New Year Struggling Me”
3. To let you know that, it’s okay to have a rough start in January because we are human beings!
4. No matter how tiny the change is, kindly do it and begin with that little improvement today. As our primary school report card read;

“There is more room for improvement.”

Thank you for struggling with me through my first article in the year after over 365 days since I last put out an article.

Happy New Year. I hope you aim for daily improvements like I am struggling to!

Cheers!