Challenge Yourself to change your Life!

I am literally at my happiest and my best when I am studying learning and teaching.  If you want me to be depressed, make me so tired, so busy (usually with non-sensical things) that I can't learn, grow, expand or teach someone something new.  

I found myself in that position a few weeks ago.  A change needed to happen! I was, well truth be told probably still am, exhausted, burnt out and restless, full of anxiety and angst.  As is my nature, I kind of turtled up and dug in for a few days trying to figure out what was going sideways in my life why I was feeling this way.  

For me to dig in I prayed, I meditated I sat quietly trying to figure out why I was ... just blech ... and nothing came.  The clinical side of my brain took over, is it my adrenals? Maybe my thyroid is off? Ya know my digestion has been a bit sucky. Lately, I wonder if that is it?  All the things were pouring through my clinical mind.  Problem is none of them was the answer.  

Then on one of my drives home just sitting and stewing on what the hell is wrong with me why do I feel soooo disconnected from practice, from teaching from everything.  It finally hit me; I am not CHALLENGING myself! 

Now I don't mean that I don't do hard things, cause I do.  But I wasn't explicitly challenging myself to grow, to expand, to learn new things and I wasn't keeping score.  What I mean is to quote Zig Ziglar I had become a "wandering generality rather than a meaningful specific."  And possibly more important I was not keeping a scorecard of what I did or didn't do that day.

So I had to figure out to fix this problem.  I wasn't growing, I wasn't learning, and I wasn't teaching my patients.  So, I had to break these things down into what they meant to me.  

Growing - Spiritually, and Physical health.  

Learning - Study, and Read

Teaching - Writing, Blog, Video, and Lecture

Family - Connect with Erin and the Kids

This is a massively simplified list, but you get a general idea.  I know from all the years around personal development and seminars, these are the things that shift my mindset, life, and happiness.   

All that is left was to pick what I'm going to do and gamify it to where it would drive me to do it.  What I laid out was a scoring system, every day I had to get so many points.  This month I have to get 6 points every day and 180 points in the next 30.

It breaks down something like this:

1 Point for Meditation 
1 Point for stretching or mobility (outside of the gym) 
1 Point for reading anything intellectual 30 minutes a day
1 Point for writing a blog post or video
1 Point for telling Erin how much I love, appreciate, respect, admire, etc. her
1 point (.5 each) for telling the kids how much I love them

There are some specific actions for me in each of those that must be done for me to get credit, but hopefully, you get a general idea.  

So your challenge from me is to find a challenge for yourself!  Figure out what actions are important for you to be happy and to take better care of yourself daily.  And gamify it.  Let me know what your challenges are for August in the comments below!

Until next time Make Health Easy

Dr. JJ