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Ask HN: What habits did you achieve this year?
This year I managed to eat 2 servings of fruit daily and I was wondering if anyone else achieved new habits
- p0d 4y agoFor the last 2 years I have walked 2.5-3 miles every day. I have lost 35kg.
- malux85 4y agoThat’s impressive! Well done! I’m slowly working my way there, 2-3 times a week I do 3-5km, lost 10kg so far
- revskill 4y ago- Writing: I try to write everyday, but only for about 30 mins each. - Exercice: I try to walk 1 hour per day after working time. My sleep is better and deeper.
- zakokor 4y agoInteresting, what do you write?
- cpersona 4y ago- I walk 30 minutes a day before work. - I do 100 pushups a day. Day 39 of doing so. 25 x 4 within 10 minutes or so. I started the year at 5 pushups after a long hiatus. I can see the changes to my physique that come from the pushups and am starting a full workout routine to augment the pushups as a result.
- melling 4y agoHow many pushups at once? “Grease the groove “? https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/09/bro-do-you-even-grease-the-groove/598837/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/09/bro-do-yo... I see you’ve answered but the technique is still worth mentioning
- ahmadmijot 4y agoWow thanks for the sharing. I hope I'll do some greasing the groove for my sedentary lifestyle.
- cpersona 4y agoThat's actually how I started. I would do 10 pushups, 10 sets throughout the day. A week later, 15 pushups, 7 sets throughout the day. In that way, I think I was following the technique laid out in the article and heartily recommend it for someone starting out. I was also dealing with some level of tendonitis in my elbow when I started so doing it this way also helped deal with the pain and working on my form to eventually reduce it and remove pain from the process. Eventually, I decided to work on building muscle as well and started doing them in a smaller time frame, within the morning, for example. Now I do the 100 within 10 minutes or so: 4 sets with a 3 minute rest in between. I feel like I've seen changes in my physique since entering this latest phase.
- steveads 4y agoI've read twice as much this year as previous years. I joined a book club back in January that meets bi-weekly. I really enjoy it and met some friends that I now see occasionally outside of our meetings.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- aliljet 4y agoThis probably sounds absurd, but I wake up at 4:30 AM to start my day every day and I used to be convinced I could only really be effective after waking up at 9 AM.
- thebigspacefuck 4y agoWhen do you go to bed?
- johnchristopher 4y agoI am betting ~4 and a half hours sooner than before.
- aliljet 4y agoIt turned out that was the secret. My self-help book is honestly more of a text message.
- nemo1618 4y agoI'm still "jet lagged" after returning from Europe -- I wake up at 6 or 7 now instead of 11 or 12, and I love it! I imagine I will eventually slide back; guess I'll have to keep flying west? :)
- mingusrude 4y agoStarted IF, not sure if it paid off but it's pretty cool knowing that I can go without food for a longer period of time.
- ducharmdev 4y agoI went from completely sedentary, to running 5km 3 times a week. I managed to run my first 5k race this year too! My goal for next year is to participate in a 10k race, as well as improve my 5k times.
- aliljet 4y agoI'd love to know how you pulled this off...
- purrcat259 4y agoCouch to 5k is an awesome resource to achieve this.
- justsocrateasin 4y agoMy big tips for this - 1. Sign up for a local 5k race 3 months into the future, thus forcing yourself to train. 2. Set up all your running gear the night before. 3. When you wake up and don't want to run, tell yourself all you need to do is put your shoes on and then you can go back to bed / not do it (at that point, a lot of "well I'm already up" kicks in). 4. Run slow. Really slow. Walk whenever you need to. Hell, walk the whole time if you have to. 5. Follow a couch to 5k program. 6. I personally enjoy running as a form of exploring streets I've never been down, trails I don't know the end of, and cities I'm new to. I think a big reason people hate running is they run too fast too soon. Run 15 minute miles if you have to. Shuffle! Slowly! The joy is in being outside and moving your body.
- ducharmdev 4y agoThis is all great advice; signing up for the 5k months in advance was a big motivation. Running slow is probably the most significant bit though - I think new runners end up hating running because they're immediately starting at an unsustainable pace.
- haunter 4y agoI can recommend Couch to 5k but there are many similar plans https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/exercise/running-and-aerobic-exercises/get-running-with-couch-to-5k/ https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/exercise/running-and-aerobic-ex... The Runkeeper guided 5k is also very popular (only first 3 weeks are free) https://support.runkeeper.com/hc/en-us/articles/360020249332-My-First-5K-Guided-Workout https://support.runkeeper.com/hc/en-us/articles/360020249332...
- petargyurov 4y agoI've been reading! I actually made a little virtual bookshelf [0] that was well received on here [1] I think I've also learned/learning to be kinder to myself. [0] https://petargyurov.com/bookshelf/ https://petargyurov.com/bookshelf/ [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31293727 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31293727
- zigman1 4y agoHey, reaching out to you here, as it your blog it says your company runs a monthly book club. Could you share some info how is it run? Do you collectively decide on the next book, meet in person or discuss it? Is the meeting heavily moderated or more informal over drink? I'm asking because I want to organize something similar in my work :) Thanks a lot!
- petargyurov 4y agoHey! I'd be glad to share. First, we're a fully remote team, so all meetings are virtual. Super informal, fun and casual. We all put it suggestions for what we want to read then we let a random wheel decide for us. Nobody is forced to read anything they don't want though! We sometimes try to alternate fiction and non-fiction. We normally give ourselves a month to read it. Some of our team have dyslexia, so they prefer listening to it. If everyone's finished it, we meet up and talk about the book. If someone hasn't, we delay the next meeting to allow them to finish it. At the end of the chat we ask everyone if they would recommend the book or not (we wanted to avoid "rating" the books out of X) That's it basically.
- wordyskeleton 4y agoThis is so cool. Might steal this idea
- petargyurov 4y agoBy all means! The GitHub repo is linked on my site.
- david422 4y ago
- autotune 4y agoStopped taking Adderall, started running daily with my dog, and being more diligent about both what I eat and food portions. Immediately gained like 6 pounds but have burned off 4 of that or so in the last couple weeks. Work has not seemed to suffer in the new role.
- mbrd 4y agoI started an exercise habit on the Concept2 rower (which I already had but wasn’t using). The big factors for me were: - accountability/competitiveness with a friend where we texted after each row - a plan to follow. Namely https://thepeteplan.wordpress.com/beginner-training/ https://thepeteplan.wordpress.com/beginner-training/
- rex_lupi 4y agoJournalling.
- fshee 4y ago- From sedentary to rock climbing quite frequently. Climbing has had the nice benefit of also: - Losing 15 pounds, gaining a few back in muscle. - Journaling of the experience outdoors (125 pitches worth!). - Making good friends. - Near zero alcohol consumption. - Regularly attending church.
- melling 4y agoI’m 26 weeks into doing machine learning on Kaggle every day. Slow and steady practice. https://www.kaggle.com/mmellinger66 https://www.kaggle.com/mmellinger66 I’m also part of a small Discord study group that is learning ML theory. We’ve gone through this book completely: https://mml-book.github.io/ https://mml-book.github.io/ Just finished the foundations part of Murphy https://probml.github.io/pml-book/book1.html https://probml.github.io/pml-book/book1.html Two of us have started to independently study the MIT Probability course, while working through the problems together https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-041sc-probabilistic-systems-analysis-and-applied-probability-fall-2013/pages/syllabus/ https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-041sc-probabilistic-systems-an... Study groups often start out with 6-10 people but if you can find only 1 good person who you work well with, it’s extremely motivating.
- rychco 4y agoHow'd you get the study group started? Some peers you already knew? I've previously considered trying to gather some people to regularly read/practice other books/topics but wasn't sure where to begin gathering others.
- melling 4y agoIt’s extremely difficult. Through Meetups, Discord, … A group of us made it through Hands on ML last year. https://github.com/ageron/handson-ml3 https://github.com/ageron/handson-ml3 But that group didn’t want to do heavy theory but someone from another Meetup did so I invited them to our group. Then someone who didn’t want to do the theory changed their mind. Try meeting people online with a well-defined common goal. For example, not simply “I want to learn machine learning” but I want to study a particular book or MOOC. Getting people to agree can be difficult. No one else in my group wants to do Kaggle, for instance. Lots of cool project ideas that don’t go anywhere. Discord seems like it should be the perfect place to meet people but most servers aren’t very active. Here’s an OpenCourseWare server I found a few days ago that’s disappointingly not very active: https://discord.gg/CSKeQegY https://discord.gg/CSKeQegY Ideally math, physics, writing, history, or whatever could be served by dedicated servers.
- mrmincent 4y agoStarted exercising most days, at least 15 minutes high intensity a day. My blood pressure and anxiety have really improved since making it a daily habit. I’ve also started writing down my daily to-do list and kept my notes in a big writing pad. So far it’s working a lot better than a collection of index cards I used to use.
- broast 4y agoI started eating vegan every other day for almost the whole year now
- bohmerforever 4y agoI quit porn.
- glanzwulf 4y agoI went from sleeping 4h a day, eating junk food and living a pretty much sedentary lifestyle, to sleeping 8h minimum, counting my macros and calories daily, and exercising 6 days a week. During the summer I read "Why We Sleep" and thought "damn... maybe I should change my lifestyle". So I went 0 to 100 in no time. It's been almost 5 months of consistency and I've never felt better and now I can't see myself going back to the way I was.
- mattmaroon 4y agoCurious: were you sleeping 4 hrs a day intentionally? Did you use an alarm? Or did you have a hard time sleeping more and figured that out?
- glanzwulf 4y agoIt was intentional. So to wake up I had an alarm since I had to be up for work in the morning. But for bedtime, I would go to sleep super late every day. I'd spend the time playing videogames, watching movies, etc. The reasoning was, I wanted to "enjoy" the time I had after work and didn't want to sleep, because going to sleep would mean after a couple of hours I'd have to wake up and go to work. So I'd prolong that time as much as I could.
- nivertech 4y agoRevenge Bedtime Procrastination? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedtime_procrastination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedtime_procrastination https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28573544 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28573544
- slothtrop 4y agoLeetcoding and study, further reduction in social media time, and working outside the house at least once a week. I already eat healthy, but have had stops and starts with exercise this year after a few life events. My winter exercise habit is to skip rope and shadow box, and lift weights. I "journal" most mornings by writing text into the ether and not saving it, except for important notes that come to me.
- wordyskeleton 4y agoTrim and lineup my beard every morning. Small thing but feel and look more put together every day. Also started making my bed every morning—takes 30 seconds and if I don't have the discipline for that then that's a bad sign.
- davidn20 4y agoI don't know if achieve is the right word, but two months ago. I decided to do one healthy habit every day. It could be meditating, working out, or spending time with friends. I believe I have only missed 1 or 2 days so far. It feels good.
- thebigspacefuck 4y agoI started running in the morning. It’s been a very slow build up, I’m currently only at 15 mpw, but it’s all about being consistent and preventing injury to keep the habit as long as possible. I’ve also begun tracking my food intake and have lost 20 lbs. Being consistent and seeing incremental progress toward my goals has made me realize the need to set goals and consistently work toward them. I’ve been writing down my goals and making plans to achieve them. A large part of this is reclaiming meaningless screen time to make a small but consistent amount of progress toward a goal each day.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- gamerDude 4y agoDaily gratitude journal. And when applicable I will share out to the person I was grateful for. It has made relationships better and life more satisfying.
- david422 4y agoI read Make Your Bed and Atomic Habits. The current habit I'm attempting to do is put things away immediately after using them instead of waiting for clutter to pile up. Put away the dinner dishes, put away the tools, put away my clothes, empty the dishwasher etc.
- Karawebnetwork 4y agoEat breakfast. The solution was to accept to eat it in the form of meal replacement powders (Soylent, Holfood, etc.). It's worth it, because even these powders are not the perfect solution. I feel like I'm really fueling up for the first time in my life.
- zython 4y agoI installed tiktok and now spend 2 hours mindlessly scrolling for that sweet sweet dopamin hit.
- tsol 4y agoI've been doing well. Dropped painkillers I was taking for migraines, dropped alcohol. Picked up weekly running and daily saunas. Started keto diet, dropped 15 lb. Fiber supplement and mushroom supplement a few days a week too just to keep things running well
- zuzuleinen 4y agoStretching every morning. Meditation every day with Waking up App. Eath between 12-18 with a 3 days fast every month.
- perlgeek 4y agoLearning a bit Norwegian every day.
- cainxinth 4y agoI didn't start a habit, I killed one: F2P mobile games designed to hook you. Never spent a dime on Hearthstone but I could tell that I was playing less and less for entertainment and more out of habit and chasing some quick hit of dopamine. I dropped that one a few months back but almost relapsed on Marvel Snap when it became available last month. It is in fact a really good game but I had the good sense to delete it after just a few weeks of trying it out. No shame for anyone that likes these games, but I could tell they weren't healthy for me.
- mattbrewsbytes 4y agoThat's awesome. I realized this year I too was playing games out of habit and now do kind of a starting check to see if I'm playing for fun or if I'm feeling compelled to do things in a game because of one or many feedback loops that have been engineered to keep me "engaged". Most of my history of playing video games is solo games with campaigns/stories, etc. so the always online multi-player games have these feedback loops with FOMO, stats on weapons/gear, etc. that make it appear to be worth your time to be constantly playing. It was hard to pull away sometimes but became much easier when you realize the top tier loot you grind for isn't making drastic differences in outcomes of playing for an average player like myself.
- Tade0 4y agoOnly habits I can think of are the ones I dropped. I haven't had a box of instant noodles for more than a year now after years of eating such things regularly - I have one last box in my cupboard as a reminder, but I don't see it as food anymore. Fast food is also now something I indulge in maybe twice a year. I also don't try to stay up when my body tells me to go to sleep - this was a major problem for me in the past. I don't feel particularly different or haven't lost any weight(I've never had weight issues), but I suppose the benefits will become apparent once I get older.
- azaras 4y agoI close my Twitter account the last week.
- lukaszkups 4y agoMaybe not habits, but I've managed to get back to trampoline/airtrack acrobatics which is an result of couple years of getting back into shape and general condition. I've also started drinkin way more water (earlier I was drinking coffee only and diet Coke)
- P_I_Staker 4y agoNone. For those of us with ADHD that are shut out from effective treatment, habits feel pretty much impossible to form.
- gmays 4y agoFor those looking to build habits, something that helped me immensely is https://habitsgarden.com https://habitsgarden.com I started using it earlier this year and my current streak as of this morning is 226 days. Before using this to track consistency I actually automated commits to a GitHub repo for certain actions :D
- whelton 4y agoWorked on (ironically) my habits and goals platform Conjure[0] every day, now 664 days in a row. Building it solo and bootstrapped I ensure I track a minimum amount of time every day to maintain momentum. [0] https://conjure.so https://conjure.so