The idea for today’s post comes to us courtesy of Stephanie Qilao at Back in Skinny Jeans. Every Tuesday, Stephanie posts about ways to make “two tiny changes” to improve and health-ify (yes, it’s a word–as of now) your life without triggering your Inner Resistance Monster. I read her post yesterday and loved it so much that I wanted to feature it today.

Go read the post.

Finished already? Wow–that was fast! Now, let’s take a look at a few of the exercises Stephanie suggested:

Stop thinking and over analyzing. Get a pen & paper and start free flow writing for 1 minute on tiny changes that pop into your head. Again, don’t analyze or judge during the 1 minute, just write whatever comes out. Now, look at the list, and pick 3 things that you could do right now, and do them. Again, no ifs, buts, or I-can’t-until. Just do it.

Here’s my brainstorming list of tiny changes: The three highlighted in red are the three I chose to do right now!
- Sit quietly–no TV, no internet, no phone–for 10 minutes every day when I walk in the door after work. (I’m working up to a 10-minute meditation for my “daily routines” challenge, but my own Inner Resistance Monster HATES the idea of meditating.)
- Use Stevia in my morning tea instead of Splenda or agave nectar.
- Stock my desk with fresh fruit at the beginning of the week for snacks.
- On days when I feel like I can’t do 30 minutes of creative writing, at least do a 5-minute writing exercise.
- Don’t check my work email at home.
- Switch to water instead of Crystal Light. (I drink OCEANS of Crystal Light.)
- Go outside for a 10-minute walk at least once during every (non-rainy) workday.
- Check email once every three hours instead of obsessively every 10 minutes.

What’s the one thing you’ve been putting off recently? Making an uncomfortable phone call? Talking to the bill collector? Going to the doctor? Make it a point this week to stop putting off that thing and get it over with and do it. You have to do it anyway and putting it off only makes things worse not better, and it sure isn’t going to go away the longer you ignore it. It will be one less thing on your To-Do list.

What’s one thing I’ve been putting off recently? Well, two significant ones come to mind. One is finishing the short story I’m entering in a literary contest (due May 31!) and the other is finishing up a mostly-done manuscript. I probably won’t be able to get both of those done this week, but I should be able to do the following by the end of the month (1) finish the short story & submit it; (2) finish outlining the rest of my book; and (3) finish editing the first 2/3 of the book. That gives me 18 days…

What three tiny changes did you pick to do right now? What have you been putting off that you pledged to do this week (or month)?

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