Long ago, in a blogosphere far far away, Jen Fulwiler wrote a post called You Get What You Measure. I've thought a lot about that post, about the things I measure and the things I am reluctant to tally up. On one of the early pages of my bullet journal I made a page for tracking habits, as a way of looking honestly at how often I was doing the good things I intended to do.
For instance: I have a solid morning Divine Office habit, but I often found myself catching up on the week's Bible readings on Saturday. I wanted to extend my good habit to strengthen a more wobbly habit. As you can see below, that worked really well in January. (The morning reading blocks are the first three items: one for Augustine, one for the pair of short easy readings, one for the Old Testament reading.)
You can also see that my motivation to sustain good habits fell off precipitously once it got to be 4pm. This is probably a hazard of trying to track my progress on two dozen different wobbly habits at the same time.
I filled up that whole page last week and found that I missed the motivation. So! For the rest of February and all of March I have a new super-sized habit-tracking grid. Blue is for things that feed my mind or my soul; green is for things that strengthen my body. Orange is for work-related or adulting kinds of things; yellow is for mom habits like getting the laundry folded regularly. Pink is for things I want to avoid, like staying up too late. (This is because I don't like pink.)
Today is my first day with the new habit tracker, and I won't be able to fill in the "in bed @ 9:45 square" with pink highlighter if I don't end this post promptly. So: happy bullet journaling to you! also the end!
For some reason the habit tracker messes me up if I put more than 3 items on it. At least it makes me absolutely prioritize what I am tracking. It does not mean that I don't have other goals, just that I do not keep track in this manner. Right now, my habit tracker is measuring: flossing, water, and speaking K's love languages. Sounds kind of weird maybe, but I am fighting gum disease, and flossing needs to become a daily habit. I don't drink enough water. And I want to be closer to K.
Posted by: Tracy | February 11, 2019 at 11:23 PM
I love love love this! That's my next bullet journal goal is habit-tracking :)
Posted by: Angela | February 13, 2019 at 12:57 PM
Bullet-journaling is something I would like to try this year and I have never thought of 'new habit-tracking'. This is just great. Thank you for sharing.
Cheers,
Jessica
Posted by: Jessica@homeaddons | February 15, 2019 at 06:37 AM