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Same. Stuck at a “modest” diet & exercise habit daily for 8 months with great results. Then I stopped for a couple days and haven’t been able to “keep the chain

by billti 4y ago

Same. Stuck at a “modest” diet & exercise habit daily for 8 months with great results. Then I stopped for a couple days and haven’t been able to “keep the chain” going again since. From the article: > While most people get demotivated and off–track after a bad performance, a bad workout, or simply a bad day at work, top performers settle right back into their pattern the next day. I think that’s the key (which I’ve not mastered). With things like Alcoholics Anonymous, meditation practice, etc. they say “If you break the chain, then don’t beat yourself up, just start again”. But obviously if keeping up the streak is a big part of the motivation, then once it’s broken that’s going to demotivate.

_gabe_ 4y ago
I've done the big red X and felt the pain of breaking the chain as well. Instead of that, I've started just listing the number of days of my latest chain on a whiteboard, and if I hit 30 days then I reset it to 0. This helps me not feel bad when I miss a day, but still gives me the feeling of don't break the chain. I've been doing it for about 3 months and I'll see if it continues to works out :)
- SyneRyder 4y ago
  I've noticed that Duolingo is does something similar. They have a streak wager feature where you bet a few gems on how long you can keep a streak going, but four weeks is the maximum. After that the wager resets to zero and you start over, trying again for a perfect month. There's also the Duolingo "streak freeze" - give yourself a couple of freeze tokens in reserve that you can use if you miss a day. Give yourself a way to earn streak freeze tokens again if you use one (eg maybe if you get 30 days in a row again). I'm currently on a 2000+ day streak on Duolingo, and while I've definitely missed days over those 5+ years, the streak freezes mean I've never missed more than a day in a row over that time. Gives an incentive to regroup and restart immediately if you do break the chain, rather than losing all motivation.

by billti 4y ago

_gabe_ 4y ago

I've done the big red X and felt the pain of breaking the chain as well. Instead of that, I've started just listing the number of days of my latest chain on a whiteboard, and if I hit 30 days then I reset it to 0. This helps me not feel bad when I miss a day, but still gives me the feeling of don't break the chain. I've been doing it for about 3 months and I'll see if it continues to works out :)

SyneRyder 4y ago
I've noticed that Duolingo is does something similar. They have a streak wager feature where you bet a few gems on how long you can keep a streak going, but four weeks is the maximum. After that the wager resets to zero and you start over, trying again for a perfect month. There's also the Duolingo "streak freeze" - give yourself a couple of freeze tokens in reserve that you can use if you miss a day. Give yourself a way to earn streak freeze tokens again if you use one (eg maybe if you get 30 days in a row again). I'm currently on a 2000+ day streak on Duolingo, and while I've definitely missed days over those 5+ years, the streak freezes mean I've never missed more than a day in a row over that time. Gives an incentive to regroup and restart immediately if you do break the chain, rather than losing all motivation.