New Habits

Let’s celebrate!

Yesterday marked the 14th day in a row I’d accomplished a new habit.

5.30 am.

Everyday.

I write.

How long do they say you need to embed something new?

I am never quite sure as it’s such a personal experience, but 2 weeks feels like a real milestone for me, and is something I am really proud of.

My alarm goes off.

I hit mute as soon as I can.

I pause… did she wake up?

Phew…

She didn’t…

Stirring the sleeping baby with one’s iPhone jingling, as I discovered one morning, leads to a sub-optimal writing window.

The key is I am alone.

I don’t hang around, I know this is a tight squeeze, so I literally open my laptop up and start tapping away.

Can I continue this habit?

I sure hope so.

Not only has it been very enjoyable.

Getting something creative completed before the day has even started has no doubt improved my mood.

But I like the output.

All these articles, inspired by wherever my mind takes me each morning, represent discipline, intuition, and truth.

Action leads to clarity.

And with each one I am learning…

One key has been to be flexible.

I am the father of young kids, indeed 15 minutes into writing this, my youngest woke up and needed me.

Now I am in bed with her.

Together we are writing!

Instead of get angry with her, or the situation, I’ve realised I must simply be ok with the disturbance.

It is what it is.

I got 15 minutes to myself, which was enough to kick-start my writing, and set the direction I need.

No-one has been able to interrupt my thoughts.

My mind is crystal clear first thing.

I love it.

Equally something fun just happened.

Whilst as I lay in bed with her the inspiration for how I would finish this article came to me.

Ding.

Like a lightbulb going off.

Over the past year I’ve hired a few different types of personal development coaches.

One of whom, Jin, shout out to her, sat me down and asked me to define what my personal values are.

In December I updated them as follows:

• Adventure
• Authenticity
• Creativity
• Freedom
• Intuition

Now, every decision I make, gets synthesised through these values.

They act as a filter on my potential actions.

As my daughter started crawling all over me, and I realised that she definitely wasn’t going back to sleep, I reflected on how this new morning writing habit was so aligned with my values.

• I am forming a new habit so setting out on a new adventure.
• I am sharing insights from my daily life so being authentic.
• I am optimising for my writing so expressing myself creatively.
• I am exclusively posting on Nostr so utilsing it’s freedom-of-speech characteristics.
• I am tuning into my mind so using intuition to guide me.

How cool!

And now my second daughter is awake…

And the dog is barking…

Haha

Time to wrap this up!

I repeat: I want to celebrate 2 weeks of writing every morning!

What a great start to the day.

Best, Jake

Ps - starting new habits can be hard, but as I learnt in James Clear's excellent book “Atomic Habits”, one great tip is to think about “habit stacking”. Not only does he really hammer home the importance of compound results, but attaching a new habit to one you already do, is a really neat trick to increase the chances of it sticking. What success have you had with this? Any wins you’d like to share? As always, DM if any questions at all.