Not-Exactly-News Flash: Consistency is hard. Day 6.
Each day I aim to come in here and write you something that’s real and vulnerable, sometimes messy, but still hopefully and ultimately useful.
But then there are days like today.
I was knocked out for half the day (my friends it is a horrible kind of hot in Manila that just wipes you out and I don’t even think it’s Peak Summer yet), and then woke up to clients asking, hey, have you been knocked out for half the day? Oops.
Next thing I know, it’s 10pm and I hadn’t even drafted anything.
I was thinking of skipping today’s entry.
But that’d be the easy way out, right? I’m trying to teach myself discipline and consistency. And also: Abstinence Violation Effect.
Abstinence Violation Effect
This has to do with substance use, usually, but I will connect. Hang on.
It’s a term coined by Alan Marlatt, and it’s…
You know how in many treatments, abstinence is the goal? While abstinence is a valid goal that indeed works for some, it’s when people presume that it’s the only acceptable goal, dangerous things can happen.
Like thinking anything other than abstinence is a failure. Imagine a situation where, if a person slips and “breaks abstinence,” the Abstinence Violation Effect kicks in when they go, “well, I guess I’ll keep going then, since I’m a failure anyway. Might as well..”
^ Dangerous.
The… er, Consistency Violation Effect?
I don’t want to be, oh, I’ve missed a day, so it’s no longer a daily journal, oh might as well not write anymore.
Now while I totally know skipping a day doesn’t make me a failure, I also know my tendency is to go, “eh, never mind then” if I do. It’s happened before. This isn’t my first daily journal rodeo.
It’s hard to unlearn decades of perfectionism (ha ha ha) and I am very likely to go the way of Consistency Violation Effect if I miss a day, because I’ll be like ehhh it’s not a daily journal anymore I missed a day okay I know I can go back but stillllll.
So I won’t skip.
(^ And I’m working on that.)
So I’m here.
It was 38 degrees Celsius / 100 degrees Fahrenheit today. I did not get much done. I brought my son to school, picked him up, and was out of it til the evening. So no status updates, other than I’m trying to write non-pain-point-y copy (and struggling a little, so, halp).
But I showed up. Even with nothing to show for. Even when I didn’t want to.
I’ll count showing up as my win when I don’t have anything else to count.
And then I’ll just show up again tomorrow.
And the day after that.
And hope showing up every day will make a difference — no matter the weather outside.
@Discipline, if you could kick in any time soon, that’d be great.
