Making the Internet My Accountability Partner

The past 30 days I have been very ambitious about my goals. First as I noted in an earlier post, I have been trying to include more fruits and vegetables in my diet. I feel like I have overall been doing good on my SMART goal. However, I have been struggling with the spirit of my goal. The spirit is that I want to have a well rounded varied diet and be excited about the meals I’m eating each day. Instead there are times when I fall back on the same old plan of eating a few apples a week and having rice, chicken, and mixed veggies for a dinner.

I’ve noticed that I don’t tend to go into the grocery store with a plan, I go in hoping inspiration will strike and it rarely does. I often feel bored as I’m wandering the aisles and I forget what my options and possibilities are. So I’m trying to create a meal plan for at least the week days prior to grocery shopping so on weeks where I feel entirely uninspired and uninterested in cooking I have a record of what I can do.

Another goal has been to practice my Spanish. So far I have been using both Duolingo and the SpanishDict apps consistently. I have a 30 day streak going on Duolingo! My streak on SpanishDict has been interrupted a couple times, but only for a day each time. I do have a few ideas of how to continue engaging in using my Spanish skills by both consuming and producing content in Spanish.

The last and most recent habit I’ve been trying to foster has been learning to play an instrument. I “chose” the recorder because I vaguely remember learning it in the 4th grade and my younger sibling still had their recorder in the house so it was free to me. I am finding myself getting frustrated because I’m not immediately good at it. But in my logical brain I know that is the process I have to suck at something before I can be kind of good at it. I am using my coping skills to handle the frustration and building in rewards for my effort. I find that rewarding effort over results is more sustainable for me long term.

That is the biggest takeaway. The best way for me to make these habits sustainable has been to focus on the process, make that mindful and joyful. The pressure of results is only discouraging. I’d love to hear from you about what habits you’ve been building and if there are any lessons you’d want to share.