Tag: good habits

  • Playing Sports (Unedited)

    My kid is on her school’s soccer team, and she loves it. We love it too, as it is the best way for her to burn off the huge amounts of energy that she has in reserve, and it keeps her off a screen. I don’t know if she will be a life longer soccer player/fan and honestly, I don’t care. I like that she’s playing on a team, and doing something physical.

    If you are not aware, I come from a very competing family. I wasn’t blessed with the athletic gene (though I wasn’t too bad at tennis) but playing and winning at games was a big thing in my family growing up. Lots of board games and wiffleball in the back yard. With two older brother who were nine and seven years older than me, it was difficult to beat them at sports as a kid, but that didn’t stop me from trying. My oldest brother played baseball, and my other brother was all about basketball. I tried my hand at both, but didn’t have the skills. I could through a baseball well, but couldn’t hit to save my life. As for basketball, I don’t ever remember feeling that I was coordinated enough to be good at it.

    My father had a rule in our house, which was we had to play a sport up until we turned sixteen. After I washed out of Little League, and junior high basketball didn’t have a place for me, my father suggested that I take up tennis, which was a sport he played. I took lessons once a week for two years, and I got kind’a good, but not that good. But my father’s point did sink in; you have to stay active and physical, or you will just go pot.

    So, I guess I am keeping the tradition alive. Going to keep her in a sport until sixteen, when she can decide for herself if she wants to continue.

    When I turned sixteen, I stopped the tennis lessons, and committed myself to my high school’s theatre department. Which, in a round about way, is also a team sport.

  • Return of the Sketchbook

    If there was one thing in life that I could fix, it would be to make it easier to hold on to good habits. I am great at creating and sustaining bad habits; I’m master at that. But good habits? Hell no. Even if I do follow the three-month rule, you know, if do anything for three months then it will become a habit; Even if I do that, for something that is good for me, if I take one day off, I will never return to that good habit.

    Case in point, and it’s not the gym, I used to be very good at drawing something just about every day in my sketchbook. A while ago, I remember reading a profile on the painter Chris Ofili, and in it Ofili described his daily routine which was that when he woke up in the morning, he would do a sketch. I thought that was a pretty good idea, and from my perspective, drawing a sketch everyday means that you are creative and accomplishing something, every day. So, I tried to keep that up.

    And sadly, I couldn’t. I go through periods where I’m on top of it. Especially with the kid, she has several sketchbooks, and it’s an activity that we can do together. But at some point, something comes up and the habit gets broken all over again. The current sketchbook that I have was started back in 2022. I’ve almost filled it up, but still, you know – there really isn’t an excuse for three years.

    So, today, I decided to get back on that horse. No more of looking at my sketchbook on my desk, gather dust. Nope. It’s time for me to get some more creativity flowing, even if the drawing is basic and simple. Getting started and creating the habit is the point, regardless of what the sketch looks like.

  • Reforming the Writing Habit

    July was a busy month with vacations, and the kid did some traveling with friends, and I had a huge home improvement project to finish. And I started watching Vikings, which I am finding really entertaining.

    Something had to give, and that was writing. After two years of writing nearly every day, I decided I should take a break. There was a nagging thought in the back of my head that if I took a break then in a roundabout way, I was admitting that writing isn’t that important to me.

    Maybe…

    The other thought I had was that everyone needs time away, a respite, time off. I have been working at all of this, blogging every weekday, working on stories and submitting them to magazines, and I especially have been journaling constantly. I have put down close to 500,000 words from July 2020 to July 2022.

    But, I got out of the habit of writing every day. Just the mechanical act of sitting down, either with the computer or a journal, and putting down thoughts and ideas. If I felt like doing it or not, I did it. Out of everything I had tried over these past two years, I think that was the achievement I was most proud of; I had a good habit of writing each day.

    With the time off, I have to restart this habit all over again. Maybe I’ll fall right back into it. Maybe I have to work at it again. Maybe none of this really is a big deal.

    Maybe.

    Now, I just got to start going to the gym again.

  • I Took A Break From Blogging

    I took a break from blogging because I was on vacation. I think I tipped my hand to this fact when my last post was about the airlines and being at an airport. But, I actually had every intention of writing and posting while I was away. I had even set time aside in my schedule.

    But, clearly, I didn’t post anything. I felt bad about it on the first day, and then I tried to write something on the second day which never materialized, and on the third day I reminded myself I was on vacation and forgot about writing. I took two afternoons to journal, but that was it.

    Now that I am back home, I need to start up again, keep the habit going. And I was ready this morning. I had my computer open, WORD doc ready to capture the magic.

    And then I watched The Drew Barrymore Show.

    The kitchen was kind of dirty, so I cleaned it.

    I went to the drug store because we were sort of low on toilet paper, and really, nothing is worse than running out of toilet paper.

    Then it was lunchtime.

    And I promised the kid we’d go to the park after lunch.

    While at the park, I finished reading Second Place by Rachel Cusk, and I thought I should write about that. But that would take some time and I should do that at home.

    So, I wrote this. On my phone. While kids are running by me at the playground, screaming with joy and throwing water balloons. (It is a pleasant though hot Summer afternoon.) This isn’t a particular important post, but it is the post where I’m stretching out my legs, so to speak. Like a pre-season game, or a friendly match.

    Just getting back into the habit, you know.

    (Say! If this blog tickled your fancy, please consider a gracious act of liking, commenting, or sharing this post. I can’t promise anything, but the last person who did that had five years of good luck.)