Whenever you start a new habit, it is a great idea to check-in. Check-ins should happen daily, weekly, and monthly. The best way to start a habit is to make it easy on yourself, make it rewarding, and be aware of what you are/are not doing. Checking in helps us do all three of those things. It breaks bigger habits, into smaller, more manageable pieces. It also gives us a bit of gratification at the end of the day to know we are staying the course. Checking in also builds awareness. Maybe we didn’t meet our goal today. Well now we know and we can make a plan for tomorrow. So lets bring this all together for our April habit, drinking more water.
Daily Check-In
I recommend using a habit tracker. You can do a good ole fashioned pen and paper or use an app on your phone. The idea here is to check in at the end of each day to see if you met your goal. Did you swap out one drink for water? Were you able to you upgrade your cup? Did you drink enough water? Give yourself a gold star or a simple check mark each day you accomplish your goal. It can be hard to see the benefits when we first start a new habit, but doing a habit tracker gives us visual reinforcement that we are making changes.
Weekly Check-In
So you have checked in each day this week, now what? At the end of each week, look over your week. What went well? What did not work at all? When you see that you forgot to take your water bottle to work for two days, and you did not meet your goals that day, set a sticky note on the door that says water bottle so you do not forget again. It is highly encouraged to make these changes as easy as possible. The weekly check-in is the perfect spot to troubleshoot and make a few tweaks. This is where you should be getting really honest with yourself. Revisit why you are making changes and recommit to another week.
Monthly Check-In
This is the big picture check-in. How did the month go? Are you consistently meeting your goals? Do your new habits feel smooth or is it still a struggle? At this point you should have a good idea if you still need to focus on this habit in order to continue to be successful or if you are already running on auto-pilot. There is no shame in needed more time to create healthy habits. Great if you are ready to take the next step.
May is Around the Corner
I hope you were able to increase your hydration in April. Let me know what tips you found to be the most helpful. Looking ahead to May, I am going to shift gears a bit. I am going to dive into something I have been seeing A TON lately at the office: upper back pain. Working from home as been hard on the body for many of you. So we will get into the why and the how to alleviate the pain and tension.
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