Monday

Monday is my day to reset for the week and get my ducks in a row - make some plans for health and home, and how I will step up for the Natural Living Challenge.

This is the yin time of the waxing crescent moon, a phase of growth, when I am planting my intentions and caring for them. I'll take time to discern and create clarity. 

Agenda:

1. Read "Tiny Habits"

2. Healthy snack habit

3. Clearing the studio

4. Giving each thing a home

1. Read "Tiny Habits":

I'm reading this book by BJ Fogg (2020), with the subtitle of "The Small Changes That Change Everything". This is the scripting process introduced in Sweet Spot, expanded on.

Chapter Four is Prompts are the Invisible Drivers of Our Lives, because no behavior occurs without one. The world is filled with them - and it's time to take the power of prompts back. "...motivation and ability exist on a continuum, but prompts are black-and-white." You either notice it or you don't.

Action prompts- actions that are already built into my day - are Anchors for new habits. I just need to find the right sequencing in which to insert a new habit. In order to create a successful recipe I need to match the anchor prompt moment with the physical location, the frequency, and the theme/ purpose of the new habit, so that the two become hard to separate, and then be sure that the new habit is so tiny it won't be hard to follow through with.

Be very precise with the anchor moment - find the "trailing edge" of the moment, the exact cue, such as "when I turn off the water", or 

2. Healthy snack habit:

Monday is my day to plan my snacks and lunches for the week, including some healthy baking. To make this habit easy, I've decided to learn and make one new healthy snack each week, and add it to my Favorite Healthy Snack List. A healthy snack includes a fruit or a veggie:

• Grapes, peaches,
• Sweet fruit yogurt
• Crackers and hummus
• Bagels, goat cheese, and tomato or avocado
• Carrot sticks with lemon juice
• Tomatoes and cottage cheese
• Apples and peanut butter
• Lightly pickled beets

Tuesday is my day to prepare the snacks, but that habit isn't formed yet. My cue is when I get home with Arthur and he is settled in with Grandpa, I'll make a new snack... but maybe I need to set up for it before I leave to get Arthur. 

3. Clearing the Studio:

I'm trying to anchor a habit of studio-clearing to right before I work in the studio - it seems like a good moment and it has worked exactly once. But this is the first full week of school, and I have a watercolor project I want to get done, so I'll get to give it a fuller test this week: 

• At 9:30 my reminder alarm tells me to start my art prep 
  routine: Make coffee, gather supplies, go to studio.
• When I am in the door, I 

  clear the table and 

  set up a place to work.
• THEN, I look around for 1-10 things to CLEAR from the Studio: 
  I have 5 minutes only, so it's a race! I need to get these things OUT of the studio, into a give-away box or the recycling or the garbage.

This week my goal is to get things off the floor

- paintings, loom, boards, empty boxes 

- but I need to clear a place on the big shelf first. 

4. Giving Each Thing a Home:

I'm still working to find a zen balance of order that feels good. I have asked myself "Why am I holding on to so much stuff - how can I make letting go super easy? How can I make sorting fun again?"

My current clearing plan is to tackle one room-clearing task, one outdoor-clearing task and one studio task each week. This week I plan to:

• Sell some books 
• Organize shed shelves
• Studio: Clear big shelf

My weekly rhythm + extras is:

• M: Garbages + studio
• T: Recycling + studio 
• W: In-basket, papers, books  (add to book donation box and take them to donate)           
• Th: Sort clothes and give some away +  Studio                                                         
• F: Deep dive in studio
• Sat: Organize shed shelves          
• Sun: Zen tidy in kitchen