May Sky Challenge

Something functional alcoholics will often say is "I don't have a problem, I just like a beer with dinner, nothing wrong with that", and a usual response is "okay, then how about you take a week off? If it's just something you like, then that should be no problem".

Of course, that's where the excuses start!

This May challenge is conceptually similar. Nothing in your morning routine would be disrupted by more than 120 seconds, if you took the time to look at the sky and appreciate it before starting in with the phone.

Again, I'm mentioning this on behalf of other people who might be a bit in denial about how they start their day.

My personal routine starts with plugging the laptop into the monitor and brewing coffee, and browsing Twitter and HN while my brain wakes up. I'm not big on my phone in general, especially not lately.

But I'm intending to add looking at the sky for the month of May (although not joining a Facebook group, yuck!).

It sounds nice.

I'm trying to work out my intended goals if I'm going to attempt such a thing. I do believe cellphone usage in bed is a negative. But if that's what I'm trying to combat, I'm not sure just "looking at the sky first thing in the morning" is going to help me accomplish reducing phone usage in bed. Because once I've looked at the sky for the morning, I'm free to do whatever, and there's only one other thing I'm going to do first thing in the morning.

The same happened when I tried to follow a course on building self esteem. It consists of writing three positive experiences and three things you're grateful for each morning. The author noted: if you're skeptical at staying on track, try it for 30 days. You'd be surprised at yourself.

All that happened was that I did this for exactly the 30 days, stopped cold, and haven't found the motivation to start again. Rereading what I wrote during that time on the occasion, I fail to see what I accomplished.

Same with a 30-day morning exercise routine. My thoughts: I'm no longer indebted to follow this person's advice. I've tried it. I've forced myself through it. I don't feel any different, except perpetually exhausted throughout the rest of the day. Now what?

I still want to do these things, because there's clearly some benefit to be had if someone went out of their way to host an entire webpage for this concept, and stating that it "sounds easy" as opposed to "it is easy". Exercise leads to better health. Writing some words supposedly leads to better mental health.

Yet it always feels compulsory, like someone on the Internet has the power to control my behavior against my will, and if I "fail" the "challenge" I'll think less of myself for it. The only reason I'm doing this is because someone I don't know suggested it, and the whole point is once you start, you have to follow through. So essentially, I feel like no matter what happens I'm roping myself into something I will not stick through to the end. Then I end up dreading every moment of it, eventually forgetting why I even bothered to try it in the first place amongst how forced and tiresome it is, and inevitably go back to my usual habits.

Ultimately it comes down to consciously not trying and staying the course in equilibrium, or trying, failing, and managing to convince myself I didn't have it in me, or that I see no benefit. For something as simple as scribbling some notes in a journal.

I noticed that my desire to exercise disappeared entirely the moment I bought myself an exercise bike and put it two feet away from my desk at home.

I also tried sleeping for a week with my phone in a separate room. Cue not being able to fall asleep outright until 3-4 AM for the entire week. At least 12 AM with my phone on night mode was better for my health before.

I don't get it. Maybe when next month comes around I'll just have to try harder, as they say. For $DIETY_NAME's sake, it's just looking at the sky.

The watching the sky thing is more of a marketing device that I might skip though.

So parent takes care of the child and is able to say "nope, don't do that". Developing this approach is what made me an adult I think (I was in my 30s already, it didn't come naturally to me).

A great trick was audiobooks. You just listen and that wakes the brain up, but a book is really, really so much better than random posts. 30 minutes as you wake up, then get up, have breakfast etc. is sure mind opener.

It becomes a habit, maybe a need even, but it's a good need. Books and exercises is the winning combination for success and happiness (seriously, just these two things put you in the top 5%, or so I hear).

Places like librivox have tons of free content. A well thought-out podcast is good too I think (long-form content). It's the idea of a passive but mind-opening activity.

Then when I'm working during the day I put the phone away silent for ~30 minutes, then take a break and chill for 5-10 minutes, then back at it, rinse and repeat. That's what got me off the dopamine hook I think.