In Thursday’s post, I wrote about my attempts at tracking good habits through the month. I came back from my trip to Peru full of motivation to keep improving. Then, reality hit. But instead of beating myself up about not succeeding as much as I’d like, instead, I took the opportunity to practice some much-needed self-kindness and self-care.
The Best Laid Plans…
My monthly goals in my second tracker are not overly ambitious. I chose goals that aligned with what I wanted to accomplish this month, in terms of professional, personal, and health goals. They’re goals that I shouldn’t have too much trouble meeting, as long as I’m dedicated. But they still didn’t match up with reality, especially for this first week.
First off, I got back from Peru with a miserable cold, exacerbated by 4 days in the jungle with no air conditioning and lots of bug bites (some of which still itch…what the hell is up with that??).
Being ill meant that I had a lot of trouble getting enough sleep every night. Except for Monday, when I didn’t have to set an alarm because it was a holiday, I didn’t once get 7 hours of sleep on a weekday. Given that, I felt like it’d be a bad idea to limit any sleep I did get by waking up at 5:30am. There go two of my goals…and, being a wimp when it comes to being sick, I had no desire to do very much exercise this past week. I didn’t fully fail on this goal, but I didn’t do as well as I had wanted to originally.
Building in Self-Care
By Thursday, I was exhausted. And I was already feeling burnt out again, despite just coming back from a vacation. I had fantasies of quitting my job despite not having another lined up yet.
Instead of any drastic measures, I went home an hour early and baked some delicious bread. Not sourdough—I didn’t have the foresight to feed my starter—but still delicious. I read a book, and ate fresh bread, and felt marginally better.
Self-Kindness and Avoiding Mindless Spending
On Friday, I had a lovely plan. I was going to go for a long walk with StarDog when I got home, and we were going to stop at an awesome burger place in my neighborhood at the end. I’d have a burger, which I had been craving all week, and read a book outside. This plan got me through half of my week, and I couldn’t wait.
So of course it started raining Friday afternoon. And it poured. In the past, I would have given up and ordered very expensive take-out. As soon as I finished eating, I would have regretted it immensely and mentally kicked myself for wasting money.
This time around, I avoided that impulse. I went grocery shopping (something I hadn’t done since getting back on Sunday). Thanks to some awesome Harris Teeter coupons, I got quite the spread for $49. Including cotton candy grapes (the best thing ever!!), Rao’s roasted garlic sauce, and pasta. The rest of my groceries included staples—bananas, milk, jam, raspberries, more pasta, acorn squash, and cheese.
Pasta has always been one of my go-to comfort foods (along with pho—noodles are a definite theme for me). I didn’t have pasta at home, or spaghetti sauce in the freezer. So instead of shelling out $30 on take-out I didn’t even want, I spent significantly less (especially after discounts) on quality jarred sauce and pasta. I made a big bowl of it (in 12 minutes flat—I have my routine down) and watched a stupid movie while drinking wine. I enjoyed it so much more than the routine of takeout and subsequent self-criticism.
On Saturday, I woke up (without an alarm, around 9am) to a gorgeous cloudy day that topped off around 73 degrees. My kind of weather! I finally got a nice long walk in and caught up on podcasts. I did laundry and dishes and napped. It was glorious. I fed my sourdough starter, so more bread is in my plans for this afternoon.
Habit tracking is great because it’s forgiving. Streaks in tracking are nice, but I know that if I have a rough week, I don’t have to feel like I’ve failed. I have a whole month to get back on track and to make better choices, and if that isn’t long enough, I have infinite months after that. Self-improvement is about that journey. I will never get to a point down the road where I wake up and think that I’m perfect. There will always be goals to strive for and things to work on, but it’s important that those goals build in the necessity of self-kindness and self-care. The world is hard enough sometimes; I don’t need to go around beating myself up and making it harder.
If you haven’t tried tracking good habits in a visual chart, I highly recommend it. It’s easy to make your own, but I’ve also created a helpful template to download via Etsy. Whether you spend two minutes (or three hours) making your own, or you buy my template (or someone else’s), I hope you find a way to celebrate success in your journey of self-improvement, but I also hope you make sure to practice self-kindness and self-care along the way.