The #1 Reason People Fail at 30-Day Challenges

Many people fail with 30-day challenges, usually not making it past the first week. And the #1 reason for failure is that they didn’t make a crystal clear commitment to do a specific activity for all 30 days.Giving your mind a clear enough commitment is a key to success with 30-day challenges. Committing to 5 minutes per day of a specific activity in a specific location at a specific time of day is usually a lot more effective than a vague commitment to “do some exercise” each day.A clear commitment is binary. Either you did it or you didn’t. There’s little or no wiggle room to give yourself credit for non-compliance.If you say you’re going to “exercise for 30 days in a row” then does walking count? What about cleaning? Decluttering? Grocery shopping? If you racked up some credits on your Apple Watch for moving a bit, will you count that as your exercise for the day? If you were to ask 10 different people if you’ve successfully completed your challenge for the day, would they always agree? If it’s not certain that every reasonable person would agree, your challenge definition is probably unclear.If your definition of success is vague, it’s almost a given that you’ll see your standards slip as you go, and within a week or two, your 30-day challenge will have faded completely. Then you’ll beat yourself up for not being disciplined enough.Lots of people have never completed even one 30-day challenge. A...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Tags: Lifestyle Productivity 30-day challenges Source Type: blogs