The incredible power of simply setting an example, with behaviour you’d like others to emulate, is awe inspiring. I see this in tutoring reading for instance. Telling a student to read doesn’t work half as well as reading yourself then passionately, intricately, excitedly sharing the treasures that lie within the books you’ve voraciously consumed.
I see this in sport, with training or fasting for instance. Telling someone to train regularly or fast is nowhere near as effective as doing it yourself and being relatively vocal/visible about it. Hard for others to argue that they'll have less energy whilst fasting after you’ve just run a marathon doing one.
Finally, and I'm actually quite proud of this one, with learning languages. We’re up to 436 days now in a row on Duolingo learning Italian. Young people especially find this mind boggling, and one in particular has taken up the challenge to reach 100 days (currently on 11). Very satisfying to see this impact play out. Our actions, our choices, and our lifestyle make more of a difference than we know.
Sleep has been intermittent and paltry this month. Drastic action is required as despite physical, mental and emotional exhaustion I’ll still get up every few hours then slowly drift off again. Better quality is needed for recovery. Upon reading the research on supplements I’m convinced that melatonin is a bad idea. The main three i’d like to try out are Magnesium threonate & glycinate; 200 - 300g of theanine (30 mins before bed); and apigenin 50mg (made by swanson, reduces oestrogen significantly which isn’t necessarily good long term). Not that keen on drugs though. I am first going to be much more disciplined with my blue light glasses from 9pm, as well as spending 2 - 10 mins outside first thing after I wake up - to set the circadian rhythm in motion. Other sleep hygiene aspects have been relatively strong so the poor quality has been surprising really e.g. same time every night, strong hydration, feeding early etc.
I wrote an article on communication that in hindsight spent more time paying lip service to the idea from a theoretical perspective, than delivering personal practical behavioural changes. Fascinating then to experience being on the other end of a poor communicator and experiencing the negative sensations that are associated. Going forward I’ll be more attentive to shaping expectations around frequency of dialogue with those close to me.
It’s been a pleasure diving into a series of essays by Paul Graham on entrepreneurship, coming up with new ideas, and the disposition/character traits most evident in the best founder’s he cultivated at Y-combinator. Not only is he a great, experienced, writer (who has strengthened my own resolve for simpler sentences and writing in general) but he is a phenomenal storyteller and founder himself. Has walked the walk. Key points he emphasises are to follow your curiosity, try crazy ideas, be intentional about who you surround yourself with, favour being earnest and independent-minded, and so on. Him and Seth Godin, who advocate maintaining a blog for the pure discipline of critical thinking on a regular basis, have encouraged me to persist journaling these monthly circumspections.
One area where I'm actually going to make a change to the list is ‘diet’. It feels like this word is anathema to the premise here anyway. A diet is usually this quick, short, change in eating behaviour to achieve some desired (usually weight related) goal. Once this goal is achieved one will typically revert to their previous behaviour and eventually ‘yo-yo’ back to their previous natural state. The intention of the list is to evolve this natural state, and set the precedent for all feeding behaviours going forward. I’d like to eat more vegetarian food, but otherwise the food I consume is fine. So the plan instead is to find innovative ways to show love & gratitude daily.
