Thought about it, snce it’s near New Year’s.
In my opinion, exercising/training/stretching atleast once a week would be a good thing for most people.
Reading books on daily basis. It’s a qualitatively different experience from reading websites or consuming other form of media. If you have trouble getting into reading, I recommend picking a particular time and place, then reading at least a few pages every day. Eventually, it will turn into a habit and you’ll be reading for longer periods. Another thing I recommend is finding books on topics you’re interested in, be it fiction or non fiction, and don’t feel bad about abandoning books if you find you’re not enjoying it.
Set a timer for when you’re sitting at a desk and working. Every hour, I get up and do something or go get some water. It helps
Make a list of all the tasks you want to do for the day, every day. This is so important for me if I don’t do this I just never get anything done.
Also always plan to do something productive every day even if you just feel like relaxing. You will feel so much better relaxing if you know you’ve done something your proud of.
Floss daily. Brush your teeth twice daily.
Use a tongue scraper.
The amount of people I used to meet through tinder back when I was single that seemingly or self-admittedly did none of that, just brushed once a day, was very concerning. Still is.
I spent all of 2024 tracking my spending and saving. I didn’t “budget”, just had a spreadsheet and wrote everything down week over week.
I would recommend it as a habit people may benefit from just to understand where their money goes.
I imagine it would be useful as a learning experience, even if that level of tracking didn’t go on forever.
I’m thinking of how tracking calories feels analogous; the time I spent dedicatedly tracking the calories of my food consumption was super helpful in recalibrating my intuitive understanding.
The first few months were a lot of effort because I had to do stuff like putting a bowl on a weighing scale and add what I considered to be an appropriate amount of cereal, and working out how many calories were in that, then doing similar for the milk. It was shocking to see how many calories were in some of the typical things I ate, but beginning to be honest about that and logging my reality was necessary to starting making positive changes. Because I tend to slip into disordered eating when I try to lose weight via calorie counting, I’ve found that I need to take a more freestyle approach and go for more qualitative goals like “eat more veg”, “cook more meals”, “drink glass of water before snacking” — goals that can be specific and towards being healthier, but don’t require too much number crunching. However, I wouldn’t have made as much progress without having spent a decent amount of time tracking things, judgement free.
The judgement free part is the hardest part, and I imagine that applies for tracking spending too. Did you ever have instances where you saw how much you were spending on a particular thing and cringed so hard that you found it harder to be truthful in your tracking? I know that I struggle with guilt a lot, and that can make it easier to put my head in the sand.
Yes, track the dollars even if the outflow is greater than the inflow. Then you will at least have an idea of where to start
Also, generally avoid alcohol consumption. It’s weird that this drink, when consumed regularly, has the ability to hijack and reprogram your biology so much that stopping can kill you. Just best to avoid it.
Just go for a walk. Calling it exercise scares people into thinking about running, cycling or the gym but for the last month or two i just make it my mission to go for a long-ish walk once a day. Nothing strenuous, some days I walk a couple of kilometres to the nearest big supermarket to pick up some stuff, or i’ll get something delivered to a post locker thing or I’ll just go for a nice walk around the nearby park and bring my neglected camera with me to take pics of some birdies.
You would be surprised how many calories it adds up to and how much better your well-being can get from some sunlight and fresh air.
That’s it! Walking solves so many problems automatically, it’s possibly the best general answer.
I’ve been trying to motivate myself to go out for walks more. I really enjoy hiking, but especially over the winter, the weather is always an easy excuse not to go out (I’m in the PNW, so winter means rain).
I just bought some nice waterproof hiking shoes that will take away at least one excuse. I’d get wet feet using running shoes, and cleaning mud off was a pain too. Having the right equipment can make going out way more pleasant. (Also it can be exciting to try out new shoes or whatever it is)
Checking up on your friends and asking how they are. It never hurts to be there for your friends when they’re having a bad day! ❤️
I stopped doing this with some of my friends. They were always happy to hear from me, but the relationship felt one sided. Once I did, I found out I was right.
Just use a password manager, FFS it makes all of your online interactions safer.
Once setup, it is easier than not using one.
Which app would you recommend/suggest?
Have used LastPass before it was shit, self hosted bitwarden and KeePass synced with nextcloud (whatever cloud service works). I ended up using KeePass with nextcloud and set KeePass to automatically save changes. Use it on Android with KeePassDX that also includes auto fill across apps. KeePass doesn’t require much setup whereas you need to setup server with bitwarden. Also had some weird sync errors with bitwarden. Having said that, bitwarden is a great piece of software.
KeePass is open source and is easy to sync via whatever service you use, Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive or something.
I’m seconding Bitwarden. I’ll also say that whilst self-hosting (if one can do it securely) may be more secure than using a service, security is always going to be a sliding scale trade off of convenience and security.
I recommend Bitwarden to everyone, but I’m sure there are options that are probably equally good. But most people could probably benefit from a password manager because we have so many different services demanding we make accounts that I reckon it’s next to impossible for any reasonable person to avoid reusing passwords across services (that’s one of the biggest security risks that hit regular people).
Start up tips: make sure your master password is strong and memorable. I found Bitwarden’s password generator for this. A passphrase tends to be more memorable than an equally long password — a good master pass phrase would have at least four words (four is sufficient for most people). Write this down in a physical place, as a backup, ideally not your wallet. it doesn’t necessarily need to be locked away, just make sure you’ll know where to find it if you forget it (I forgot mine a bunch at first and had to reference my backup a few times).
Password managers and security in general can feel overwhelming because of the instinct to do things properly, which might include things like self hosting a password manager, or only avoiding biometric sign-in on the phone app version rtc. However, the best password manager is one that you use, and if bits of convenience like this help, then it’s a good trade off.
It reminds me of the joke about two people who see an angry Grizzly bear in the forest, which starts charging at them. One of the people starts running away, and the other shouts “Where are you going, you’ll never outrun the bear”. The running person replies “I don’t need to outrun the bear, I just need to outrun you”. That’s a bad paraphrase, but the sentiment is that using a password manager at all puts you way ahead of many people, in terms of security. Obviously, you’d feel more secure if you knew you could outrun the bear, but if we spent too long being anxious about our ability to do that, we definitely will get eaten. (Apologies for such a long comment. I always do this when I’m procrastinating going to bed. I hope you have a nice Christmas, if you’re celebrating that wherever you are.)
Bitwarden is the best in my opinion
I use keepass XC, and keep it up to date on all my devices using syncthing.
I have considered bitwarden with self hosting, but keepass had always worked well.
Waking up at the same time every day, no matter if it’s a weekend or a weekday and no matter if you stayed up too late and won’t be getting full 8 hours of sleep.
As obvious as this might sound, this has really helped me to regulate my sleep schedule, something I’ve really been struggling with for pretty much my entire life.
Never start nicotine
I’d also like to chip in that alcoholism is sneaky. Be careful with drinking
And honestly take it easy on weed. A little for fun is fine, but chronic heavy use can kick off schizophrenia and depersonalization disorder, and literally lower your IQ.
Yeah alcohol really sucks. It’s so embedded into society most people expect you to start drinking regularly as soon as you can. I think it’s getting better but still people are nowhere near as cautious about alcohol as they really should be it accounts for 10% of deaths worldwide, that is just mind boggling.
I had to avoid alcohol for a while because of a medication I was on and it drove me mad when people would press me after I said “I’m not drinking”. I think it makes people feel weird about their own alcohol use? But if they’re that self conscious, maybe they need to do some self reflection about whether their alcohol use is a problem.
A phrase I’ve been seeing more in recent years that’s a small thing that feels impactful is stuff that says “alcohol and other drugs”. It is a drug and needs to be treated with respect, and ideally caution
Learn stuff, don’t eat processed foods and get exercise - gardening and foraging are good places to start for most people. Stay far away from negative, manipulative and lying people.
Learning how to say no, how to do it politely and how to do it firmly. I’m better at the latter but being able to do either is a goddamn superpower, it’s incredible how many Americans cannot regardless of their situation, title, age, wealth, etc.
Absolutely lifting weights has been my all time favorite self improvement thing, would highly recommend it
I second this as a non-sporty person. I bought a couple of barbells (15kg apiece) for use at home and 20-30 minutes of just messing around with them daily has solved so many joint aches, it’s almost ridiculous…
Just to note, the form has an impact and can cause more negatives than it solves if not done properly.
Duly noted and you are very right! I looked up a couple of simple exercises beforehand as I’m really not keen on getting a herniated disk or something.
From what I’ve seen, as long as it’s nothing fancy like advanced calisthenics and power training, the exercises are straightforward and easy to grasp.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future…
sunscreen…
would be…
it.
The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists.
~ Baz
I wear a sunhat everywhere in the summer. People seem amused by it but I’m 50 and have lovely skin.
jokes on you buddy, I don’t go outside
Which was written by Mary Schmich: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wear_Sunscreen
So many people don’t care about how their behaviors affect others. They are loud on the public transport, interrupt others when they talk, act like they are better because they got good looks, and a bunch of other things.
I really think people would get along better if all of us were more down to earth and listening and relaxing.
Be the opposite of what you see in reality shows.
