It has been about a year since I wrote “Sidekick Strategies That Lead to Superhero Habits.”
It sounds suspiciously like a “New Year’s Resolutions” blog, but my goal was to kick start some healthy new practices in my life. You can that original post here. In it, I share five habits I intended to create or grow: 1. Date My Wife, 2. Journaling, 3. Praying, 4. Reading, and 5. Encouraging Others.
Yes, it was ambitious—I’m grateful for small victories (and a few major wins). A quick look-back, with a hope that something in my story will encourage you to make your own list of superhero habits…
#1: Date My Wife
Grade: Huge Success.
Over the years I’ve put a lot of pressure on myself to take my wife out on a regular date night, but it rarely happened. It just wasn’t practical for our lifestyle. So, Friday was date day. Yes, day! We met for lunch on at least 45 of our 52 Fridays. We enjoyed each other’s company, talked about life, and shared how we were doing. We did our best to continue to get to know each other, but we also talked about our kids and covered “calendar” issues for the week. We moved “us” time from the sidelines to the field.
#2: Journaling
Grade: Fail!
I’d love to blame this on the journal I chose, but I never bought one. I’m adding this to my list of superhero habits I want to develop in 2020.
And yes, I already purchased the journal.
#3: Prayer
Grade: Marginal Growth.
I’d say that my prayer life this year has been similar to my prayer life last year. It’s good, but I’d like to see continued growth in this area.
#4: Reading
Grade: Huge Success.
This is one area where I made a slight alteration. When I wrote the original piece, I suggested a site called Blinkist. After my initial trial period, I discontinued. It was a good tool, but I decided to go in a different direction. I ended up subscribing to Accelerate Books. I actually purchased one of their lifetime subscriptions (they only sold a limited number). This site writes summaries of Christian books—its library right now is limited, but growing.
In addition to book summaries, I purchased an Audible subscription. For me, purchasing the Kindle version of a book and owning the audio version and reading while listening has made a big impact on my retention and speed. One cool thing about subscribing to Audible is you can return the audio version of a book anytime you want. I don’t know why this is okay, but I love it.
#5: Encouraging Others
Grade: Marginal Growth.
I am growing as an encourager, but I still have a ways to go. It’s easy for me to walk past someone and say something encouraging, or go to somebody and say something intentional about something I see in them, but my goal was to write more encouraging notes. Maybe that’s an odd pressure I’m putting on myself, but I think it’s important and I didn’t do a great job of it this year. This one will go back on my list for 2020.
I’m not a big believer in New Year’s resolutions, but I’m all for healthy habits. I encourage you to write down the habits you long to develop and share them with someone. Maybe even pull someone in to your life who is doing well what you would like to be doing well.
Photo by Esteban Lopez on Unsplash