Success is a measurable thing. But it is usually other people’s rulers that we use to measure it. I had a terrific year of personal successes in the past year and the biggest reason for this was that I used my own measurement tool for the first time in a long while.
Many years ago, I smoked. It wasn’t something I did for a very long time but it was a habit I had and, no matter how often I tried to give it up back then, I couldn’t seem to kick it. Until I reframed the problem as being sick of giving up rather than tired of smoking. So I resolved, instead of determining that I was going to give up and then failing to do so, that I would pay a lifetime toll for the consequences of starting up again. So the aim was to give up giving up. I picked a date and told myself and anyone who cared to listen that that date was the last time I was giving up smoking. That if I took it up again after that date, I would smoke for the rest of my life. I have not thought about smoking since. Somehow, my alternative emphasis on the act of giving up rather than on the act of smoking (or not) made me kick the habit. Emphasis mattered. And it was my alternative measuring instrument that, I believe, helped me to succeed in that instance.
This last year, I’ve slowly improved a number of areas of my life In years previously, I have set Big Hairy Audacious Goals, drawing on the wisdom of those with knowledge about the setting of such things. Mine have typically ended up with early onset baldness somewhere in the first quarter. This year, however, I made the bar for success VERY low.
- I wanted to lose some weight: all I resolved to do was accurately log my calories, no matter how many I consumed. I denied myself no food groups but, if I ate it, I logged it.
- I wanted to improve my drawing and sketching skills: I made a commitment to post to Instagram with something I had drawn that day. Every day. No matter how bad I thought it was. Just put something up there. I have just passed my 300th post.
- I wanted to learn more about technology: This daily blog is the rib-prodder. Some days it’s well considered content that makes it on here, others less so. But I put down a few words every day.
I have a few others, but hopefully you get the idea.
I have achieved this by making failure really difficult and making success easy.
I started with one goal at the start of the year (no, they were not particularly SMART) and, as I built confidence in my ability to keep doing the daily thing daily, I added in others. I now have six things that I do each day in areas of my life that matter to me. Teeny little things that, done each day, have added up to some pretty big things that I can look back on as impressive (to me) accomplishments for this year. By reframing success into tiny steps and each step being an accomplishment, I have covered quite a lot of distance. In the same way as I reframed giving up smoking as giving up giving up, this simple means of defining success as something on my own terms, and then using my own measuring tool to keep me accountable, has been very effective.
Now to repeat in the next year.
Deciding what I would deem as success each day. and making that a really simple and easy thing, I have been remarkably successful. Even if I do say so myself.