Small good things & hopeful habits

The things we do to push on through

Sometimes, when you are crumbling a little (or a lot) under the weight of all that’s going on around you, it’s the little hopeful habits that see you through.

For me, it used to be things like “walk 10 000 steps” or “get up at 5am to write” or “spend 30 minutes on a crafty project each day” or “complete draft chapter of book” or “work on website redesign”.

Lately, because of various health-related things, my hopeful habits have become much less ambitious. I’ve shrunk them down to simple stuff that is mostly achievable. Things like “drink a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice each day” and “take medication on time” and “avoid alcohol” (does not do well with previous habit!) and “listen to an audiobook at bedtime” and “write something in journal” and just recently I added “read a chapter on the Serial Reader app” (I have started with A Room with a View!)

I’ve installed a counter app on my phone and I’ve added a counter for each habit so I can see my progress. (It’s called Days Since.) There’s one for the orange juice. Another for the journalling. Another still for the alcohol avoidance. And there is something about watching the numbers go up each day that makes me feel like I’m making progress. This is especially bolstering when I am finding that I can’t do a lot of the things I would like to be doing (due to ME/CFS.)

I look at the colourful counters before I go to sleep and I can see that I am doing good small things each day. These good small things, these hopeful habits, stack up and even when I’m not managing the bigger things (like keeping up with study in the way that I want) I can see that I am managing the things I can. Which is a comfort to me.

And that’s the thing isn’t it? We can only do what we can do. There is absolutely no point beating ourselves up over what we did not achieve. Much better to count up the things we can and remind ourselves that we’re doing our level best. Don’t you think?

There’s usually a very good reason for not doing the things we might THINK we should be doing … And sometimes it’s important to give yourself a pass and do those things when the time feels more appropriate. Or even not at all, sometimes.

Love to you, dear reader. You are ace.

xx Pip