Posted on January 7, 2022

"The fact is, life is more fun when I keep my resolutions.”

—Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

It’s 7:00 a.m. and I’m on my couch writing my daily post with my cup of decaf coffee. It’s still dark out. Not long ago the mere idea of this situation would have seemed a bit unbelievable to me. Now, in fact, I am very pleased with how the past two days have gone.

Even though it was only a couple of days ago when I made my highlight of the day to be rearranging my calendar using time-blocking and the framework from Make Time: How to Focus on What Matters Every Day, by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky, the results so far—yes, only one and a half days of data—look promising. Yesterday was a highly productive day. I got to complete every highlight, every energizing activity, and even the daily reflections I intended to do. It’s fair to admit that some things shifted and some durations changed, but still finished them all.

This level of productivity—in terms of work items, as well as of personal goals—seems to be a total mood booster. I felt great yesterday when it was 9:30 a.m. I had already written, exercised, meditated, showered, had breakfast, and was ready to start my first highlight block of the day. Then, in only 6 hours of three laser focus highlights spaced during the day I managed to finish tasks that would have otherwise taken me 10+ hours—spread over many days because I usually tend to procrastinate when I don’t have a concrete plan of action. Having a system that allows me to keep my resolutions is working great so far. Even more, being able to complete the things I aimed to do, while having time to energize during the day via my personal goals, is both fun and happiness inducing. It’s sunny now.