Streaks, Breaks, and Reboots: Getting Better Without Giving Up
Perfectionism is not an excuse to throw in the towel.
Oh, Snap
You told yourself that this time would be different, but here you are holding two halves of a snapped streak.
Streak breaks happen to everybody. Sometimes life just gets in the way or we’re hit with an entire shitstorm of bad news in the same week.
Sometimes we simply make the unhealthy choice in a brief moment of weakness.
If you’re like me, you started strong on your 2024 goals then dove facefirst into a slump. I broke three of my most important streaks over finance-induced stress (which I now realize is my biggest trigger for bad habits), and have struggled until this week to reestablish them.
Whatever happened, breaking your streak is not the end of the world. The length of your streak is an arbitrary number. A streak’s power comes from what it stands for - the focused commitment to a goal.
Reflect
The important thing is to not let one day turn into two, three, or ten days. Now you’ve formed a new habit.
Instead of continuing to break your streak, take a few minutes to reflect on the conditions that led to your break in the first place. Was it a freak accident? Or is there a pattern of behavior you need to adjust?
It’s healthy to reflect on your mistakes; it’s unhealthy to ruminate on them.
I don’t know exactly what your slump entails, but I do know that the first step to get out of one is to stop digging.
Reboot
When you do break a streak, don’t panic. Everything will be fine. Take a few minutes to recalibrate and get back to crushing your goals.
For me, a reboot always starts with a tough workout that pushes my body and mind well outside of comfort. I then do stream-of-conscious journaling where I’ll mediate a conversation about my goals with the two sides of my brain: one voice that tells me to stay where I’m at and the other voice that tells me to be better. The weaker voice is battered from an hour of heavy lifting, and its feeble arguments for breaking the streak are quickly shut down.
As bizarre as it sounds, this mental debate club has always helped me define the underlying issues of my slump. It often presents blindingly obvious solutions or new perspectives to my situation. If you haven’t tried conversing with your brain this way before, you’ll be surprised at how quickly it can lead you to the solution.
Regardless of your reboot strategy, taking some time to recalibrate is vital to rebuild your momentum.
If you don’t have your goals for your streak written down, write them. With a pen, typing doesn’t count. A goal that isn’t written is just a wish. I imagine there is something you’d like to accomplish by building your streak, so define what that is.
When you remember what you’re working towards and why it’s important to you, breaking your streak will get more difficult.
The number doesn’t matter; the decision to keep working does.
Thanks for the read and the claps. Leave your strategies for handling streak breaks in the comments.
Until next time.
