Asklemmy

I'm reading a book about fostering good habits, and there's this novel idea that you should celebrate your small victories.

As someone who has struggled with depression most of my life, I can tell you that often times most things don't seem worth doing. Like, why bother making the bed if I'm just going to mess it up later?

Well, if you only do the things that seem worth doing, you can run into trouble when your perception of what's worth doing is skewed. And as you do less and less because nothing seems worth it, you'll find that it starts taking more effort to do anything at all.

But if you allow yourself to feel good because you did something, the outlook starts to shift. Suddenly you want to do things because that means you're winning. Nothing feels better than feeling good, so your brain will seek out more of that behavior.

Then almost before you know it, you realize your perspective has shifted. Nothing seemed worth doing before, but now suddenly everything is worth doing as long as you can feel good while you're doing it.

Okay, so enough with the sermon, here's the technique:

Break the activity into its smallest part, and when you accomplish that part immediately celebrate.

Example, if you want to make flossing more worthwhile, celebrate after you floss each tooth.

That's it.

Celebrating will look different for different people. Say "Awesome job!", fist pump, strike a pose, do a dance, smile, make sound effects, congratulate yourself, imagine thunderous applause, pretend you're in a video game and you just got 100 points, mentally affirm that you're starting to get your shit together. It doesn't matter what it is, as long as it makes you happy.

Anyway, I don't promise it'll be easy or happen overnight. But if you start small you can foster this feeling of celebration and suddenly things will seem more worthwhile.