Daily Disciplines: What I am learning.

Starting a new year, almost all of us have things that we want to change about ourselves.  We come up with grand ideas about how we are going to be better people in the year 2014, about how our lives will change, about how this will be our year.  The new year brings about that longing for a new me.  A new person.  New year, new person.  We all know the story.  Once we get a couple months in, that new person resorts back to our old ways and 2014 is the same year as 2013.  In order to fall out of this trap, daily disciplines.  Daily disciplines allow us to reflect on the direction of our life on a daily basis.  To make sure that the decisions which we make line up with our vision of the future.  To understand that in order to achieve a goal, we need to make progress on that goal, no matter how small, everyday.

I just read a post by my friend Ali about the importance of the seemingly insignificant, small things and how each of those seemingly insignificant things are actually big things (click here to read her post). They are HUGE! I have never actually set aside time each day to consciously write down what I have done that day or reflect on my decisions to understand where I am right now and where I am going and if my decisions that day have helped or hindered that ultimate goal.

I am currently working on trying to design a worksheet for myself in order to have something to fill out daily which will be able to serve as a time for me to plan out my day, reflect on the daily activities, and allow me to have something concrete to look at and map out my thoughts and be able to see myself change throughout the process (hopefully changing for the better... I think that is the ultimate goal, right?) I have been a little bit spotty here at the beginning of the year in my filling out of these worksheets and am still in the process of creating something that will benefit me each day, but I think this will always be the case.  It will always be something that changes from day to day, and so I hope that I will be able to sit down and focus everyday in an attempt to understand what kind of person my decisions are crafting me into.

It is the daily choices that we make that create our character.  I am challenging myself to create daily disciplines for myself to follow.  I challenge you to do the same.  Do something small everyday in order to achieve a goal in your life.  In addition to your everyday activities whether it be work, school, projects, dedicate 15 minutes a day to thinking, to dreaming about something that you want to make happen, and then another 15 minutes on writing, or planning different concrete steps to try and reach that goal.  Good luck!!

Hugs,

David Melia (Professional Free Hugger)