[2021-09-17] Never miss twice
I missed my daily walk yesterday. I had a lot on the go and told myself that I would go for my walk once I had all my tiny tasks out of the way. The problem was that I had so many tiny tasks that I didn't get out for my walk before it was time for Chris and me to leave for our volunteer gig. And by the time we got back home late yesterday evening, it was too late to go for a walk.
The result was a day that felt off—abnormal and incomplete.
Today, I vowed not to repeat the error. I went for my walk right after breakfast, as I usually do, and fit everything else around it. My step count for the day was back above 10,000, exactly where I like it to be.
As Atomic Habits author James Clear explains in a section of his book on how to recover quickly when your habits break down:
No matter how consistent you are with your habits, it is inevitable that life will interrupt you at some point. Perfection is not possible. Before long, an emergency will pop up—you get sick or you have to travel for work or your family needs a little more of your time.
Whenever this happens to me, I try to remind myself of a simple rule: never miss twice.
If I miss one day, I try to get back into it as quickly as possible. Missing one workout happens, but I'm not going to miss two in a row.
Until yesterday, I hadn't realized how important my daily walk is to me—how integral it has become to my well-being. Getting back to my walk this morning after yesterday's lapse was consistent with Clear's advice to never miss twice.
In the same vein, while I haven't had a lapse in my streak of writing a daily post (408 days and counting), I think it would feel odd not to produce an entry for this blog every night. Even on the day of my hysterectomy, I managed to publish a post, however brief: "Surgery was a success. Sleeping well. Felt all your support. More to follow tomorrow."
Clear continues:
The first mistake is never the one that ruins you. It is the spiral of repeated mistakes that follows. Missing once is an accident. Missing twice is the start of a new habit.
This is a distinguishing feature between winners and losers. Anyone can have a bad performance, a bad workout, or a bad day at work. But when successful people fail, they rebound quickly. The breaking of a habit doesn't matter if the reclaiming of it is fast.
My habits of walking and writing every day have clearly taken hold. I feel better when I maintain these rituals—normal and complete.
