Got a little distracted there with 4th of July vacation, but now I’m back, ready to pick up where I left off. Before the little summer break, I started drafting this post and figured it’s a good place to start back up. Especially since it’s exactly the modus operandi I’ll be taking to jump back into writing the next book. I call this earth-shattering approach the “one thing a day way.” Let me elaborate.
You have probably heard the expression “one thing at a time,” an oft used phrase to describe tackling one problem at a time in order to make a laundry list of to-dos less overwhelming. “One thing at a time” is a positive approach towards a negative scenario: an attempt to make the complicated easier to navigate. But what if we applied that mindset to positive developments as opposed to reserving it for mere problem-solving?
Genesis
“One thing a day” has been an approach I’ve been taking for a while now, starting back when I needed to focus on my health. I had a lot of problems, and it was too overwhelming to think about how far I had to climb to get back to normal. So, I simplified it: do one thing a day for my body in order to move the needle. It was so effective, I started applying it to everything in my life. Now I approach each day with a list of “one things,” with no exact order of when they happen each day, but with the awareness that some should take priority over the others.
The List
1. One Thing for the Body
Whether you are sick or just want to get stronger, this is really priority one. Get out for a walk. Go outside and get some vitamin D from the sun. Get moving. The secret to health is not some new probiotic or magic pill—it’s that modern convenience has destroyed the physical output requirements we need to keep our bodies operating efficiently. We’re all walking around with gunked-up carburetors.
And if you are going to do any of the other things noted below, you’ll be better able to tackle them if you are healthier and stronger (and happier because you got some exercise!)
2. One Thing for Someone Else
I know this may seem too early to put on the list, given how busy life is and how many other problems there are to solve each day, but this one is a high priority for me. If I start my day by putting someone else in mind before I take care of my needs, I feel so much better about the day. I have more gratitude for everything that comes next and also feel like I did something that was productive for the world around me.
Sometimes I do something for the house, like fix a light or something else that was bothering someone in the family. I might paint a wall that got messed up from someone bumping into it or take the dog for a walk. It doesn’t have to be big. Just one thing where you think, I know so-and-so wanted this—let me see if I can do that for them. Or… I should let them know how great that day together was—I’ll write them a letter to let them know it. Any act on behalf of someone’s feelings or needs is enough to improve my feelings about my day dramatically. I have found that giving a piece of me or my time has always lifted my spirit way more than receiving gifts in return.
3. One Thing for Your Job
You’ve got to be practical, so you have to turn your attention to what pays the bills. And of course, you have way more than one thing to do each day for your job. But what I like to do is carve out a little time each day to make sure I’m doing something that will make tomorrow a little more efficient and a little more profitable. Streamlining tasks, organizing data, evaluating where there are redundancies and unnecessary vendors… anything that makes tomorrow a little better or a little easier.
Rather than looking at work as a day of have-tos, I try to look at it as a game, kind of like Clash of Clans, where I can fortify my defenses, build systems that expedite tasks, train dragons when I’m not around, and give it the tools it needs to grow itself. The main difference, I suppose, is that I don’t attack other forts. Nor do I work with goblins. I have worked with a couple of giants, though.
4. One Thing for Your Dreams
Maybe your job isn’t your ideal, so set aside time each day to work on what is. Or maybe your job is fine, and you have personal dreams of adventure or things you want to do for your family. Rather than let them float around in your mind, give them at least fifteen minutes of your day to bring them to reality. Make plans. Start building. Fifteen minutes today will rapidly increase in length when you see how fun it is to give your dreams the time they deserve.
For me, my dream of being a writer needs dedicated time to come to fruition. So, while I still have my day-job, I dedicate hours each day to putting words on paper.
I write here to get practice and share daily thoughts, and use these “reps” to hone my skills for the book I’m working on. The steps involved in writing a book can feel overwhelming on the whole, but if you approach it with the mindset that you just have to eat a little each day, it gets easier and easier to bite off larger chunks.
5. One Thing to Make You Sing
You’ve got to try to have a little fun in this life, otherwise, what’s the point? I try to find something each day that gives me joy. Sometimes it’s doing something with my wife and/or my kids. Sometimes it’s a hike. Maybe it’s doing what I want for work, like writing. Or maybe it’s just taking in a movie. But usually, for the day to get me feeling a little lighter on my toes, I gotta sing. Maybe you have a terrible voice, in which case, you might want to try humming or whistling. But my spirit makes me want to sing, so I do it every day. Even if it makes other people’s ears hurt. For me, it releases endorphins and gives me a hit of dopamine without needing to eat a snickers bar. I’m happier and my belly is leaner for it. Win-win.
6. One Thing to Learn
This one is important. Each day I make sure I’m targeting at least one thing to learn. Sometimes it’s as small as a fact about an event or person, but usually I’m trying to learn some new skill. I took up guitar last year and try to learn a new song each week. This week I’m learning Towers by Zach Bryan.
Each day is something different. Sometimes I spend time learning AI tools, so I understand how the future world is going to work. I studied Epicurus a couple of weeks ago because I’m weird and it was on my mind that while I knew a little about him, I didn’t want my understanding of him limited to someone else’s Wikipedia page. So, I read up, culminating with a review of Lucretius’s On the Nature of Things, which is considered by many to be the definitive work capturing Epicurean theory. And I can tell you now, honestly, I kind of hated it. But at least I now know for myself exactly what’s in it.
More Things
There are more “one things” you can add, I’m sure, but this is the core set I adhere to. If you try it, you may find, like me, that one thing a day actually turns into many more, quite quickly. It gets easy. When you start to exercise, your body begins to want more of it, and you end up doing more of it, perpetuating the benefits. When you learn a new thing like guitar or take on a new hobby, you expand your cognitive reach and actually build new neurons in your brain. How cool is that? Kind of makes you want to pick up more things to learn, doesn’t it?
Like everything else in life, once you start doing one thing, it gets easier to do more. Because these “one things” are all geared towards positive development of spirit, body, and mind, it gets a little addictive when you feel how good all of them make you feel about the direction your life starts to move. I know for me, this approach has led to way more than one thing a day for each item. It gets too easy and gratifying the more you do it.