“We become what we repeatedly do.” ― Sean Covey
On Google, there are more than 64 million links on “the habit of writing.”
Here’s just one. 10 Steps to Create the Habit of Writing. In procrastinating my writing, I’ve probably read several hundred. Jeff Goins made it even simpler when he wrote, “pick a space, set a time, choose a goal.”
I do know what it takes to create a successful habit. Since last summer, I’ve developed a new healthy one. I walk my dog every day, 2-3 times a day, with the goal of hitting 10,000 steps every day. I accomplished this with tools. My Fitbit, MapMyWalk, great podcasts, my accountability group and my dog, Ellie. When you develop habits, the frequent repetition of the task, becomes involuntary. I mean it helps that Ellie, won’t let me forget it but there is definitely a ritual I’ve developed with this healthy habit. And I did walk her before my goal but it was the addition of the hitting 10,000 steps a day that helped cement this task into a habit.
When I wrote the title to this blog, The Writing Habit, I thought of wrapping myself in a habit. As the other definition of habit, “a long, loose garment worn by a member of a religious order or congregation.” That was comforting to me. Thinking about wrapping myself in writing, surrounding myself with synonyms, languishing in language. I started this blog, to do just that, but when my job, my business and life got in the way, my daily writing habit, fell apart. I no longer made writing a priority.
At Goddard, an advisor gave me some good advice when I was struggling with just getting started, find a song, or a place or just light a candle to signal the beginning of your practice. These rituals might not be necessary for you, maybe sitting down and just writing is easy for you. Rooze wrote me some great advice, check out the comment section, of Let Nothing Go Down the Drain.
Today, write about some new positive habits you will start in the next year. If you already have a successful writing habit, how can you deepen your writing in the next few weeks of 2015?
Lovingly,
The Writing Nag