You ever realize when you fall off the wagon of reaching your goals, you go back to old habits?
What if, you didn’t fall completely off the wagon? What if, you had changed your default settings?
Getting to this point is hard because it still takes discipline.
For example, when it comes to my health and fitness goals, working out comes easier to me than eating healthy does. But even then, when I fall off the wagon, I fall off the wagon for MONTHS on end.
I’m going to sidetrack from my post for a bit, this portion is actually unintended.
But I’ve started to reflect on how I got to this point and it’s because I did the 75 Hard challenge by Andy Frisella.
If you want to read more about experience, here is the post: https://xlexbitz.com/2020/07/08/what-i-learned-from-75-hard-challenge/
After I completed 75 Hard, even though there were times when I did fall off the wagon completely (not eating healthy, not working out, not drinking enough water, etc.), my relapse have been shorter. Maybe a month tops.
I have been the most consistent since I’ve done the 75 Hard challenge.
Maybe it takes 75 grueling days to create a new “default setting”
Let me rewind and get back on track with what I wanted to say about default settings.
My new default setting is, even if I “fall off the wagon”, not every single one of my good habits have gone out the window. The two habits I will always default to is working out (or doing any form of physical activity even if it is going for a walk or jump roping for 5 minutes) and drinking at least half a gallon of water.
And if working out goes out the window, I’m still drinking my water. and as I have said before, my “relapse” time is shorter.
Mostly a week and I’ll hop back on the following week. It’s rare for me to go longer than a week of being fully inactive (but there have been times when it’s gone longer than that).
What I want to say is, try and rewire your brain to create a new default setting.
Skipped your workouts and been eating out everyday?
Make it “normal” for you to go to bed by 9 PM every night and still wake up at 5, even if you aren’t motivated to go to the gym or workout.
Make it “normal” for you to drink enough water each day.
Find YOUR default setting.
So that if you do fall off the wagon, you’re not having to start over and rebuild your habits.
We all know how much it sucks to start over.
So make it less tedious with a new “default setting.”
(Reminder: it might take awhile to create a new default setting but STICK WITH IT)