Shane AldendorffHey ya’ll It’s been a while since I haven’t made a post and given an update on my experiment. Truth is, it’s been pretty hard keeping up with this experiment.
In previous posts, I’ve mentioned reasons for why the specific experiment I attempted back in October (trying to reduce my phone usage) was particularly hard – namely my phone operating essentially as my emotional pacifier. But as crippling a phone addiction i may have, I feel there is a ‘deeper’ reason for my inability to stay on top of this.
It all comes down to the ONE habit
The issue is not simply that it is hard to try to reduce my phone, but it just simply hard to keep this goal or ‘experiment’ as I’ve been calling it, top of mind.
That is, the habit of keeping track of my phone use, the habit of daily, being mindful of the ways I would like to improve myself, THAT very habit is what is lacking.
The experiment could be ‘making my bed everyday’ or ‘drinking 8 glasses of water everyday‘ (I need more than that btw), and I would still fail at tracking and reporting on the experiment.
What I DO need to build then, like, what emerges as the cornerstone of my ability to intentional grow, to intentional try experiments with various aspects of my life and see if they lead to positive outcomes, is a regular or systematic way of reflecting on my life and the experiments I’m running. In short, I need what some may call a journaling habit.
The idea of journaling regularly is one that has always really appealed to me. Partially because I have a naturally retrospective or introspective inclination, and have, with varying success, been able to regularly journal at different junctures of my life, but I eventually lose the habit.
All that said. It does feel to me that some form of ‘Journaling’, or having a regular pattern of reflecting on one’s life is a cornerstone habit i must build in order to successfully intentionally build other habits in my life – sooo…..
That’ll be the next experiment I’ll run – Journaling everyday for 30 days.
Next Steps
But before I officially start the experiment, I’ll need to research and explore:
- What the best time of journaling would be for me
- What ‘Platform’ or medium I’ll want to do that do (Pen & paper? Notion? Obsidian? Drafts? etc.)
- What format my journaling will take
- What questions will ask myself, what kind of data would I want to track.
I’ll report back on these ^^^ in my next post
“The unexamined life is not worth living”
I’m pretty excited to embark on this journaling journey. We all have varying levels affinity for introspection, but I personally very much resonate with the words of Socrates, taking the time to examine one’s life, to strive to intentionally steer it in ways we feel drawn to, in some sense, the best way to live.
