Have A Weekly Project

May 18th 2007

These last two weeks I have been experimenting with having a weekly project. My first week involved doing a media fast. This week, I have been attempting to go to the gym for five days. The purpose of this is to break old, bad habits (in my case, procrastinating over going to the gym and wasting too much time watching TV and downloading music) and replace them with more positive ones. Spending seven days focusing on this is a good timeframe; not too short that you don’t get any benefit and not too long that you lose motivation. Below are the key points you need to bear in mind when considering doing your own weekly project.

Will the theme of your weekly project benefit you? If not, why are you doing it? My media fast week gave me back a few hours per day, while my gym week is making me more fit. The end result is that I have put the first cracks in my procrastinating, time wasting habit and can build on that in later weeks.

Be clear what your boundaries are. For instance, the goals for my media fast week were to avoid watching TV and listening to music, but if I happened to be in a bar or pub with music playing, that was acceptable (and unavoidable). I was also allowed to watch House and football (obviously!) but no other TV shows. You should not take your weekly project that seriously.

Don’t be unreasonable. Your weekly project needs to fit into your lifestyle and not involve radical change. If you want to spend the week getting up at 6AM but you normally get up at 9AM, that is asking a lot. Spend a few weekly projects getting up 30 mins earlier each time, until you have hit your target. For instance, I’m not putting unreasonable pressure on myself by saying I should spend two hours at the gym everyday.

You can have more than one theme. For instance, during this gym week, I am capitalizing on my previous week, by allowing myself to listen to music again (noticably, I don’t feel inclined to have music on all the time anymore) but not buy/download any new tracks so I can fully appreciate the music I already have.

Don’t beat yourself up if you break the rules. After all, you have seven days to work with. Just because you didn’t stick to your targets one day, don’t assume you have failed, just continue as before the next day. It’s better to have the intention and desire to build up a new habit than to just give up at the first hurdle.

Share your goal. If people know what you are trying to do they are usually very supportive and encouraging. Plus, it gives you that extra push to hit your target so you don’t have to turn around and say you didn’t achieve it.

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