I feel like recently I’ve been on a complaining and yelling rampage. When the kids are bad, I yell. When something’s not “up to par”, I complain. It’s not good but I’m not one to sit and wonder why things aren’t changing. To see change you must make a change, right? For the first 21 days of April, I’m going to do something VERY difficult (at least for me!)
- No complaining
- No yelling
- No criticizing
Only positive things will come out of my mouth for the next 21 days. How am I going to stick to this?
- Every morning as soon as wake up, I will remind myself to be positive. I’m going to leave a Post-it on my phone to remind me.
- I will then think of one thing I’m grateful for and write it down.
- Throughout the day, I’m going to be more mindful before I speak, intentional with all my words and tone of voice, I will also take several deep breaths when I get angry or frustrated.
- Last, I’m going to use the app HEARD on my iPhone. HEARD runs in the background, continuously listening to nearby audio. If I break one of my rules, I tap the app’s button, and the audio from the recent past is saved to a file. I’ll then replay it to determine what triggered my reaction. Sounds a little creepy but I think it will open my eyes to common triggers and help me adjust.
- I plan to carry around a notebook that will not only act as a reminder but also to make note if/when I fall off course and why.
I’m really interested to see how difficult this will be for me and what kind of change in mindset I will have at the end of the 21 days. I hope you join me in the 21 day experiment!
My wife is so excited!
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