If you’re anything like the rest of humanity, you believe a new year is a new chance for opportunity and change. Making goals and resolutions for the year is a good way to get ready for what is to come. That said, here’s a motivator you can do every day and benefit from!
What is “Don’t Break The Chain?”
Years ago, famous comedian and actor, Jerry Seinfeld brought to light an effective and motivating way to finish tedious tasks by simply marking on a calendar each day for a whole year. He once said to a young comedian, “The way to be a better comic is to create better jokes and the way to create better jokes is to write every day.” Seinfeld told the young man to put up a calendar that showed a full year and cross off every day that he accomplished his writing. “After a few days you’ll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You’ll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job is to not break the chain.”
The trend caught on to a larger audience in the past year or so when internet personality and graphic designer Karen Kavett started making printable calendars for people to use.
Link to her blog post for the 2016 Don’t Break The Chain calendar!
http://karenkavett.com/blog/2630/dont-break-the-chain-calendar-2016.php
It seems like a daunting task and overwhelming at first, but I promise it's an extremely rewarding process and actually becomes easy after a while. I recently finished my chain for 2015. I am a writer so I decided to do “An Idea a Day.” I would write down a good (or bad) idea for a show or movie. Looking at the document where I logged each day’s idea is more satisfying than I could have imagined when I started at the beginning of last year.
Why you should totally do it.
I realized that participating in “Don’t Break The Chain” made me think about ideas ALL the time. Even if you do something that doesn’t require writing what you did each day, (i.e. exercising, practicing an instrument, or learning a language) you’re still doing something beneficial everyday. Although it really is up to you what you choose! You could choose to do something three times a week, twice a week, every other day, etc.
Learning something new or making sure you have enough free-time to do what you really want can be tough. That’s why I’ve provided these tips for starting a chain of your own!
Tips:
1. Pick something you will ACTUALLY do!
Remember you’ll be doing this for a year or so. Make sure you are willing and able to do whatever it is you choose.
2. Pick a task that challenges yourself but isn't too hard to complete.
You aren't trying to write a novel or solve world hunger each day. Think smaller tasks that are easily attainable.
3. Be specific.
If you want to exercise everyday, be specific as to what exactly you want to do. Do you want to run for 20 minutes every day? Do 30 crunches? Bike 15 miles?
4. Don’t give up no matter what!
Get pumped about starting a new project and sticking with it, or finally accomplishing a goal you’ve always wanted to reach!
