Reading Time: 2 minutesAsk Yourself This Morning Question Every Day This Week
Simple Instructions:
- Each morning, identify for yourself what “success” for the day would look like.
- Use your own personal standards for success. Some examples include: completing incomplete actions, getting to the gym after work, having a conversation you’ve been avoiding, getting your pile of clothes to the cleaner. There is nothing too big or too small. What would make you feel successful today?
- Write it down.
- Get it done by the end of the day.
Watch this video for an explanation of this Well-Being Practice from Whole Life Challenge co-founders Andy Petranek and Michael Stanwyck.
Why Is This Practice Important?
Do you ever get to the end of the day and wonder if you did anything meaningful? You probably got a lot done, but was it all in a rush? A repeat of the actions you do every day just to keep up?
It’s not uncommon for us to declare what success in the far-flung future would look like, but it’s relatively rare that we approach our days the same way. Yet, it’s virtually impossible to get to that successful future without a series of successful days along the way.
There is no absolute definition of “success.” It’s different for all of us, and it may vary from day to day. It’s easy to paint a too-grand a picture of success or to discount the small daily triumphs. Therefore, planning for and celebrating the completion of something can be a practice in the kind of mindset it takes to be successful, on your terms.
Taking on a practice of acknowledging the things that make your life work — from getting big projects done to just making sure there is coffee for the morning — is a way of focusing your energy on actually doing the things that make your life work. Starting your day pointed in a direction is a much surer way of ending up where you want to end up and shaping your life to look the way you want it to look.
He graduated from UCLA with a BA in philosophy as well as a degree from the Southern California School of Culinary Arts, and feels food is one of the most important parts of a life - it can nourish, heal, and bring people together.
Michael believes health and well-being are as much a state of mind as they are a state of the body, and when it comes to fitness, food, and life in general, he thinks slow is much better than fast (most of the time). Stopping regularly to examine things is the surest way to put down roots and grow.
He knows he will never be done with his own work, and believes the best thing you can do for your well-being starts with loving and working from what you’ve got right now.
