My 10 Daily Habits (inspired by Leap Day!)

February 29th, Leap Day, marked a new beginning for my family this year! My wife started a new job (congrats, Gillian!), my daughter made the huge move from the infant class to the 2s class at school (which she loves), and I started a new set of daily habits. My hope is that I will be able to do all of these, each and every day, and that doing so will make me happier, more productive, and just a generally better person.

Here’s the list: Love, Write, Read, Learn, Move, Sell, Connect, Give, Cook, and Sleep.

Let’s take a look at what each of these means to me:

Love — I start each day with love. The best part of every day is waking up next to my amazing wife. And then hearing my daughter yell “Daddy!” and giving her a huge hug and kiss. If you do nothing else, make sure to show your closest friends and family members that you love them, each and every day.

Write — I’ve been meaning to make writing a daily habit for quite some time. Writing gets your creative juices flowing. It’s a great thing to do early in the day, before you get too busy. It also helps you to accomplish many of the other items on the list too — like connecting and learning as your followers respond! I love to write, so starting this Leap Day, I blocked time on my calendar to write each day.

Read — This is a big one. Most people I know read a bit each day, but what you choose to read makes a big difference. Use your reading time wisely. Make sure you’re reading things that will make you happier and more productive, not just entertained. I split up my reading time in 3 – one third help me stay abreast of career/industry news; 1/3 what is happening in the world; and 1/3 pieces that inspire personal growth.

Learn — You might think this is similar to reading, but I think it’s quite different, and it’s something I need to do every single day. If I’m not learning, I am just not a happy person. This could be doing a few minutes a day of an e-learning course, it could be getting scuba certified, it could be learning inbound marketing. It’s easier than ever to learn, for free, we just have to make it a habit.

Move — This is an obvious one, but not my strongest area. We all need to take some time each day to move our bodies around. There are ton of ways to do this, some of which are way more fun than others. 15 minutes is a lot better than 0 minutes, but 30 minutes is my daily goal. 10,000 steps is a helpful guide too. If I don’t get it done, I will add the time and steps onto the next day. Wish me luck here.

Sell — Selling is a huge focus for me this year. This one is going to look very different for each person depending on your career, role, etc but it’s an important part of being a human. Be passionate about something, whether you are making money from it or not, and try convincing someone to care. Most of us have to do this in one form or another, whether it’s to our significant other, our toddler, or a potential client. Sell each day and guess what, you’ll get better at it. And that will help you in a lot of areas in life.

Connect —For many, this comes naturally. Whether it’s Facebook, email, iMessage, Hangouts, whatever, do prioritize connecting with people outside of your immediate family. Life is more fulfilling when you’re making connections with people. This applies not just to people you already know, but also to make connections with new people. I know I met a lot more people in my 4 years in college than I meet now. And I still benefit from that investment today. Connect each day to build your pipeline for the next decade. I’m pretty introverted, but I’m going to do this, because I know it’s worth it.

Give — Try to do something each day to give back to your community. Send an unexpected gift to a friend you’ve grown apart from. Make a small donation to a charity. Say hi and smile to everyone you meet that day. Pick some flowers for your significant other and put them in a vase. Spend a few moments each day thinking about what you can do for someone else, with no expectation of reciprocity. I’m going to make giving a bigger share of my time this year.

Cook — This one is almost laughable, for those who know me. I’m not the best cook, certainly not a very experienced one, but I can follow directions, so I can cook. Cooking is maybe not the most ‘time efficient’ task, but it’s rewarding and I want to get better at it. I love good food. My wife is going to love that this is on here, I have quite a bit of catching up to do in this department.

Sleep — Everyone sleeps each day, but not everyone sleeps well. Or enough. Does it take you a long time to fall asleep? Good sleep is a skill and a habit that pays off in spades in terms of productivity. The average American gets only 6.8 hours of sleep a night, when experts say we need at least 7–9. I have been doing pretty well in this category since my daughter started sleeping through the night, so maybe this is an easy checkbox for me now, but it won’t always be.

Last, but definitely not least, we must measure results. Here’s what my scorecard looks like so far:

You can see I’m not perfect, but at least I know how I’m doing.

Establishing better daily habits is one big way I am going to improve this year.

Do you think I can get all of these done each day? Can you? I would love to hear how you keep yourself happy and productive, or whether you’re going to give this method a try!