Happy New Year! I’m looking forward to seeing what 2024 holds, but have some rewinding to do to December 2023.
Here’s your monthly recap:
Best Book I Read This Month
Better Than Before by Gretchen Rubin is a great read on habits and behavioral change. While I love books like Atomic Habits, I think this book better highlights personality differences that impact our daily lives and ability to change behaviors. You can find it here.
Best Article I Read This Month
“In Godzilla Minus One, Government Won’t Save Anyone When the Crisis Comes” is a movie review from the magazine I work for, Reason, that I can wholeheartedly endorse. I don’t typically watch movies in the theater multiple times, but I saw this film and immediately took my sister with me to see it again. I’ve loved Godzilla movies since I was a kid, but this one was perhaps the best monster movie I have ever seen, capturing the idea of Godzilla being a representation of Japan’s national trauma in the aftermath of World War II.
Tip + Trick of the Month
January is the time for new goals and resolutions, and tracking helps support these endeavors. I’m a fan of data tracking (and I’ll talk more about it later on in this recap) and have found two apps to be extremely useful:
Tally is excellent for numerical goals. Here are a few examples of things I track:
- How many times I walk the dog in a month
- The number of hours I spend outside
- Any sort of weightlifting goal
- Number of miles I walk in a year
Streaks is great for consistency and frequency goals. Here are a couple of things I track:
- Did I get 7 hours of sleep last night?
- Did I meet my protein goal for the day?
- Did I read that day?
- Did I close my Apple Watch exercise ring?
I track a few things throughout the day if it’s simpler for me to reference it in the moment instead of looking up a data point later, but I typically keep things simple and just track everything quickly when I go to turn my phone off every night. Easy!
Quote of the Month
“Because what you give your attention to is the person you become. Put another way: the mind is the portal to the soul, and what you fill your mind with will shape the trajectory of your character. In the end, your life is no more than the sum of what you gave your attention to. That bodes well for those apprentices of Jesus who give the bulk of their attention to him and to all that is good, beautiful, and true in his world. But not for those who give their attention to the 24-7 news cycle of outrage and anxiety and emotion-charged drama or the nonstop feed of celebrity gossip, titillation, and cultural drivel.” -John Mark Comer, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry
Thought for the Month
I track so many data points in my life: my macros, number of hours slept, books I’m reading, workouts—the list goes on and on. As an extremely type A person, I love being able to have data to reference. But not everyone thinks tracking is a good idea.
Many roll their eyes at data tracking, especially when you are tracking something you already like to do. “Why not just enjoy it?” “Why stress yourself out?”
There are three reasons why I think data tracking is amazing, even if you enjoy the task you’re tracking (or hate tracking):
1. It is simple to default to comfort, and on hard days it’s easier to stream Netflix and hang out on the couch than it is to pick up a challenging book, get a walk in, or cook an actual meal…goals serve as behavior prompts and tracking is the daily reminder of these goals.
2. On the days when I don’t believe I’ve accomplished anything I set out to do, actual data reveals that I am casting votes for who I want to be.
3. Data tells us the truth. It’s easy to convince ourselves we’re getting enough sleep or working out every day. Tracking our actions can either prove us right or expose where we’re fooling ourselves.
If you have never tracked a goal before, I encourage you to try it. You may find data tracking to be a useful tool.
Good luck with sticking to your goals to start the year—I believe in you! I’ll catch you next month.
KELVEY OLIVIA VANDER HART 