Wellness Wednesday
1% Better Every Day
Do you want to know the secret to accomplishing all those goals you daydream about?
It’s not winning the lottery or making some earth-shattering change in the way you live your life. It’s about taking one small action every single day that moves you one step closer to where you want to be. This concept is called continuous improvement and it’s all about focusing on becoming 1% better every day.
What does it mean to be 1% better?
Becoming 1% better every day means focusing on the one tiny action you can take today to get one step closer to where you want to be tomorrow. It means sticking with these tiny actions, day in and day out (even when you don’t feel like they’re working) because you know they’ll compound into something significant.
Instead of focusing on a huge, overarching goal that seems impossible to reach, you focus on your everyday habits instead.You save a few bucks toward your rainy day fund or go for a short walk… until all those tiny actions add up.
This process isn’t newsworthy. But it works and it also helps build your self discipline. It's all about making every single day count.
What does becoming 1% better everyday look like?
Here are some examples of what becoming 1% better everyday may look like for your health, and your overall life as you build your ideal day.
For your health
- Going out to eat one less time than you did last week
- Exercising 30 minutes a day
- Eating a little less processed sugar than you did last week
- Drinking a little more water
- Getting a good night's sleep (a least 7 hours)
For your life and overall productivity
- Writing down something you are grateful for every morning
- Decluttering your life
- Turning off notifications for your email, social media, and text messages
- Setting aside five minutes a day to connect with someone you love
How to become 1% better everyday
Now that you have some examples of what becoming 1% better every day looks like, let’s talk about how you can start implementing this practice into your own life.
1. Define what “better” means for you
“Better” looks different for everyone. My idea of “better” is to be able to spend a little less time on social media and read more. It might also be setting a goal to run a little further than I did last month. It could be learning 1 new recipe a month. What does “better” look like for you? Take a moment to do some goal setting.
2. Examine your old habits
Once you’ve defined what “better” means for you, it’s time to examine your habits to figure out what’s working and what’s not.
Remember, getting 1% better is mundane. It requires you to take small actions every day that are really easy to do, BUT are also really easy not to do.
For example,reading 10 pages of a book every morning is easy to do. But it’s also easy to fill that time with a TV show.
Setting aside 5 minutes to journal about what you’re grateful for is easy to do. But it’s also easy to spend that time on Instagram.
Examine your habits and pinpoint which tiny tweaks you can make to move the needle toward your goals.
3. Be patient and trust the process!
As you begin focusing on getting 1% better every day, you may not feel like you’re making any real progress. One day you’ll be super excited about working toward your goals — whether that’s paying off debt or learning a new recipe. And the next day you may wake up and say, “What’s even the point?”
But the key to becoming 1% better relies on you sticking with those tiny actions even when you don’t feel like doing them. It relies on you trusting that your actions are quietly gaining momentum and that success is bubbling right beneath the surface.
Remember, magic happens in the mundane
The beautiful thing about achieving success is that you don’t get there by trying twice as hard or making some sweeping change in your life. You just focus on being 1% better today than you were yesterday.
