There's no time for a new beginning like the first of the month, I've read. To inject some consistency into my content creation efforts, I'm revisiting a challenge that I fondly completed before: the 30-day item challenge.
For those unfamiliar, this challenge, conceived by my good friend @rubencress, delves into the significance of our habits and the items we use as we approach a new year. While many will wait for the first day of the new year, the right time for anything you want to accomplish was yesterday. The next best time is today.
As a brief explanation, the challenge involves choosing and showcasing one item in your employ (that you use) each day. The exercise could be a reflection on our choices, consumption or other motifs in our lives. I, for example, consume a fair deal of marijuana.
What motivates me to do so? Why don't I stop? Questions like these could be the focus of exploration if I choose to discuss my paraphernalia, for example.
The First Item
The first item showcase is a hand-me-down Fitbit Charge 2. I won a free giveaway of an earlier make back in my freshman year of college and loved it. But, when that wearable lost its band, I lost my habit of tracking fitness and activity. The habit upticks in notice as I navigate my life into adulthood and ideally, a long life.
I enjoy cheeseburgers and do not want to stop eating them anytime soon. After reading Atomic Habits by James Clear, I learned the power of habit tracking. Unfortunately, despite reading the book, I still have some less favorable tendencies. I stopped picking my nose, thank goodness. Yet, I still sleep very late and skip activity on some days.
This gift from my girlfriend's brother was one step towards a better version of myself: one who could help during the moving process or one who could take off his shirt at the beach- the dreams of any ambitious man.
A Habit of Good Health
If I track how much time I contributed to video gameplay, health tracking, fitness and activity come in dead last by comparison. It's really, painfully easy to sit inside, say you'll go tomorrow, or even complain of an ache for a day or two longer.
I think health ties so much into life, that if I don't take an active role in it like all my other desires, I could wake up one day and ask myself where my youthful vigor and appetite went. I could find it difficult to perform tasks as basic as taking a flight of stairs. I love gaming, eating and lazing about as much as the next young adult, but a chronic health condition is more than I'd like to stomach for the time being.
I'm still unemployed, young and ambitious. Let's not spoil the only thing I got goin' for me: youth.
A Challenge To Readers
I am not much for calling people to action; I tried many times in the past with varied success. If you should find yourself so inclined, I challenge you to find an item you use everyday and talk about it, every day for 30 days. If you don't go that far, at least you can tune into my journey.