[juliebarkley]

I ran across this old cartoon by José María Nieto today:

 

"I don't see any reason to be optimistic. What do you think the new year will bring us?"

"I believe it will bring flowers."

"Really? Why?"

"Because I am planting flowers."

 

And decided it was a perfect sentiment for a challenge. (I tried to storify it in my head, but sadly I failed.)

It works for the wider world, and in the microcosm of one's own life.

 

I still need to work out which seeds I want to plant. In my own life and in the world.

I haven't done this yet, but I needed to get a challenge up so that I don't forget. Time is passing so quickly lately.

My habits book should help, but I'm not done. So my seeds will be imperfect. But imperfect seeds are better than no seeds.

[DarK_RaideR]

Can't plant seeds without first digging a hole...

 

[Jarric]

6 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

But imperfect seeds are better than no seeds.

 

Wise words indeed. I hope you find your seeds soon.

[KB Girl]

Great cartoon, promising challenge setup

[Cheetah]

I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

 

Happy challenge!

[Mad Hatter]

16 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

I haven't done this yet, but I needed to get a challenge up so that I don't forget. Time is passing so quickly lately.

Tell me about it! 

 

Cute cartoon!

[Mistr]

You reminded me that I bought tulip bulbs that I still need to plant. Thank you!

[Jupiter]

Great challenge. Following!  

[KB Girl]

How goes?  

 

[WhiteGhost]

I am little bit surprised that I am only just now finding your challenge.  How are things?  Did you get your hard drive all replaced without incident?

[juliebarkley]

On 10/24/2022 at 4:29 AM, DarK_RaideR said:

Can't plant seeds without first digging a hole...

 

We will call that ... prep time.

 

On 10/24/2022 at 7:58 AM, Jarric said:

 

Wise words indeed. I hope you find your seeds soon.

Time to work on it!

 

On 10/24/2022 at 10:05 AM, KB Girl said:

Great cartoon, promising challenge setup

Thankee. Though given how late I am starting, it may span two challenges. We shall see.

 

On 10/24/2022 at 11:27 AM, Cheetah said:

I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

 

Happy challenge!

As am I Cheets, as am I.

 

On 10/24/2022 at 5:43 PM, Mad Hatter said:

Tell me about it! 

 

Cute cartoon!

Right?!

 

On 10/25/2022 at 6:09 PM, Mistr said:

You reminded me that I bought tulip bulbs that I still need to plant. Thank you!

Excellent! I have been of use!

 

On 10/26/2022 at 7:44 PM, Jupiter said:

Great challenge. Following!  

Welcome! Always lovely to have you!

 

On 10/29/2022 at 10:38 AM, KB Girl said:

How goes?

It hasn't, but now it can!

 

On 11/3/2022 at 4:26 AM, WhiteGhost said:

I am little bit surprised that I am only just now finding your challenge.  How are things?  Did you get your hard drive all replaced without incident?

That would be because I didn't post on it after creating it, most likely. I still love you. The hard drive is the story of the day, so...

 

______________________________________________________________________________

My hard drive has been a weight the last couple of weeks. It made the things I needed to do take four times longer than they really should, and the fact that things could crash, or the whole drive die, at any moment was quite stressful. And I really couldn't do much of anything extra, due to the lack of time and unpleasantness of computing. I wish I could say I made great use of the time by staying off the computer and doing other things, but that would be a lie. However, I have done a fair bit of tidying up in the last couple of days, so things are looking a little better. And I finished reading my language book too. And sorted things out for our Halloween. So I guess some offline things did happen.

 

My new drive arrived on Thursday and got installed today. It should by all rights have been a ten minute job, but things did not go so smoothly, and it was a stressful three-hour affair before the computer finally recognized the drive. But now it is working! And I have a significantly larger drive to boot! I am feeling very !!!!, and I confess I have been just enjoying the smooth computer use and playing a few games rather than doing anything significant.

 

But! My goal for tonight and tomorrow is to plan my flower garden. See you tomorrow!

[Jarric]

14 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

My new drive arrived on Thursday and got installed today. It should by all rights have been a ten minute job, but things did not go so smoothly, and it was a stressful three-hour affair before the computer finally recognized the drive.

 

This sounds quite familiar - I had the opposite issue a year or so ago; putting my old hard drives in a new motherboard. Ended up having to find drivers for them on another computer, stick that onto a flash drive, and then reinstall Windows including the new drivers

[juliebarkley]

10 hours ago, Jarric said:

This sounds quite familiar - I had the opposite issue a year or so ago; putting my old hard drives in a new motherboard. Ended up having to find drivers for them on another computer, stick that onto a flash drive, and then reinstall Windows including the new drivers

Oof. Replacing a motherboard sounds like more trouble than it's worth!

 

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So, today I:

- explored a new set of trails because the weather was so awesome;

- played poker with friends;

- helped my son with a finance assignment;

- created a character for a new in-person D&D campaign starting tomorrow, and sorted out some other stuff for same.

 

Today I did not:

- finish setting up habits.

 

I did make some progress on this challenge, but I am not going to have things ready today. The other stuff just took up too much time. But I don't regret any of it.

[DarK_RaideR]

Good to see you back again, hope there's more smooth sailing from here on out

[KB Girl]

On 11/6/2022 at 6:40 AM, juliebarkley said:

So, today I:

- explored a new set of trails because the weather was so awesome;

- played poker with friends;

- helped my son with a finance assignment;

- created a character for a new in-person D&D campaign starting tomorrow, and sorted out some other stuff for same.

 

Today I did not:

- finish setting up habits.

 

I did make some progress on this challenge, but I am not going to have things ready today. The other stuff just took up too much time. But I don't regret any of it.

Sounds like a very good day, the setup can wait a bit longer  

[Mistr]

I am glad to hear that your computer now has a functioning hard drive. I am not surprised that you wanted a break after dealing with that stress for weeks.

 

I hope you can pick up some of your other projects now.

[juliebarkley]

On 11/6/2022 at 2:13 AM, DarK_RaideR said:

Good to see you back again, hope there's more smooth sailing from here on out

It's looking good.

 

On 11/7/2022 at 3:10 PM, KB Girl said:

Sounds like a very good day, the setup can wait a bit longer  

It's all still in progress.

 

On 11/7/2022 at 3:14 PM, Mistr said:

I am glad to hear that your computer now has a functioning hard drive. I am not surprised that you wanted a break after dealing with that stress for weeks.

 

I hope you can pick up some of your other projects now.

It is so lovely to be able to type and not wait for a minute after each phrase.

 

Working on it.

 

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I decided to finish up Tiny Habits, and am currently flipping back to take a few notes (I have to return it). I'll be done that tonight, I think. Very excited to try it out! I have all day tomorrow to set up some good starting habits. But that's all I'm giving myself - I've wasted too much time and I don't want to get lost in perfectionism.

 

Spoiler

Struggling hard in other ways. I hurt someone real bad yesterday. I didn't mean to, but I should have known better. We talked about it, but I'm not sure what's going to happen going forward. I lost a lot of sleep last night, and I've been a wreck for the last two days. (More than that actually, for a different reason). Here's hoping time will heal.

[Mad Hatter]

Spoiler

I'm sorry that really sucks. Hugs!

 

Interested to hear about what habit things you're gonna try out!

[juliebarkley]

11 hours ago, Mad Hatter said:

Interested to hear about what habit things you're gonna try out!

I'm almost but not quite there.

 

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You know how I said I was going to have my stuff ready for today? Apparently I lied. I got all my notes done, and I have a nice clear step-by-step process. Also have a nice long list of prompts, daily occurrences to link things to, other potential habits to try, and celebrations. I've started the brainstorming and sorting process for all of my D&D stats. I still have to make things tiny and work on making each habit easier, plus actual pick the habits to start with. But my brain is tired from the brainstorming, so it'll have to wait until tomorrow or I'll make bad choices.

 

In other non-habit news, my son decided I should be a nun for some reason I can't remember (probably to do with talking about his school's uniform), so we looked up the requirements for becoming a Catholic, Orthodox, and Buddhist nun. Takeaway: I would need to get started posthaste, or possibly get some forged documents. Which seems like a bad first step for entering religious orders, but hey. We then looked at a nun's blog, where she recommended stalking other blogs and friending nuns on Facebook. Then we wondered if there were nuns on Tiktok. There are.

[Loveable_Bouncer]

Maybe this challenge is to test drive habits. You have the list, see how it goes. 

You have dug some holes and have some seeds. Soon they will grow when things come together!

[Mad Hatter]

13 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

Takeaway: I would need to get started posthaste, or possibly get some forged documents.

Wait what? Off to the google machine… 

[juliebarkley]

On 11/11/2022 at 6:29 AM, Loveable_Bouncer said:

Maybe this challenge is to test drive habits. You have the list, see how it goes. 

You have dug some holes and have some seeds. Soon they will grow when things come together!

It is! And given how absent I've been, I'm going to have to roll it over, I think.

 

On 11/11/2022 at 3:47 PM, Mad Hatter said:

Wait what? Off to the google machine… 

You have to get your in with the nuns by age 45. And you need them to "approve" of you several times before that, so you'd need a little time to work them. (It's all just a popularity contest, I tell you!) And since I'm not a Catholic, I'd have to do the conversion process first. That's bound to take even more time. So a fudged birth certificate, or maybe conversion certificate, would give me some breathing room on this new career path of mine.

 

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All right. The book suggested a bunch of things. Variety. Not doing too many things at once. Theming tasks and prompts. But most importantly, picking the thing that seems easiest that will give the most impact, and that you are also excited and genuinely want to do (rather than feel like you should).

 

So here are the first five habits I'm planting. I will most likely add more over the course of the challenge, change these, add to them, etc. They are a starting point for experimentation. I have lots more ideas and things I want to try. Let's see what will grow!

 

After I fold and put away my scarf, I will take my dirty clothes to the laundry room, then I will celebrate by doing a big victory sign.

After I decide to go to bed, I will pick one important task for the following day and highlight it, then I will celebrate by thinking "I got this".

After I get out of my chair at home, I will do two pushups, then I will celebrate by doing a fist pump.

After I get back from my walk, I will open a book (instead of the computer), then I will celebrate by pausing and taking a deep breath.

After I hear my son get home, I will go say hello, then I will celebrate by smiling big.

 

I will rehearse all of these tonight so that I will remember them, then roll them out tomorrow for real!

[juliebarkley]

All of my habits (except the before bed one; that will happen soon) triggered today successfully. My arms are achy from the pushups. Had a conversation on how to fit another habit I've struggled with into my routine, and have an idea to try. And I got my important task done, which I had procrastinated on for months.

 

Sure, some of this is bound to be that early wave of motivation excitement. But it's been a really successful day, and I'm really happy right now.

[Mad Hatter]

11 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

Sure, some of this is bound to be that early wave of motivation excitement. But it's been a really successful day, and I'm really happy right now.

It really doesn't matter! What matters is that you're happy and making the changes you want! Love the celebrations.  

[juliebarkley]

9 hours ago, Mad Hatter said:

It really doesn't matter! What matters is that you're happy and making the changes you want! Love the celebrations.  

You're right of course.

 

I like the celebrations too. The author didn't say so, but it made me think of when I have trained the cats to do things - you want something that signals that they've done good and makes them feel good immediately. That's what these do for me. It makes perfect sense - you're training yourself to do something, after all.

 

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I've been sick today, so some of the triggers didn't happen (I didn't go for a walk, and my son didn't go to school), but I did the ones that did trigger. I learned that when you are sick, you can reduce the difficulty of pushups while keeping the habit by doing them as wall pushups.