I remember setting New Year’s resolutions as a child. Things like, “wake up at 5:30 every morning1” and “write in my journal every day”. I think I was eight or nine. Even at a young age I somehow internalized and romanticized the idea of an ideal morning routine. I longed for peace, tranquility, structure, order — something to assure me that I was doing it right. What “it” was? I couldn’t have told you. Who defined “right”? Again, I couldn’t say, but it was probably a smattering of sources, dominated by the check list evangelicalism of the 90’s and enforced by my own idealistic bent.
I’m an idealist to the core. I believe there is a right way to do things and a wrong way, and I want to be right. Life, however, is funny. God in all his wisdom has frequently seen fit to challenge my fixed ideas of the right way to do things, and so with age, children, many moves and many transitions, I keep being sifted. I’m learning — slowly, repetitively, painfully — which things matter, and which don’t.
But what I continue to struggle with is this question:
If I’m just going to have to start over, begin again, get interrupted, repeat the task, have to set up a new system etc… what’s the point of trying?
Anyone who’s ever stayed at home with small children knows how arduously pointless the day can seem. There is no measurable progress! And once you’ve set up your furniture after moving for the tenth time, you can start to wonder if hanging pictures is worth it when you’re only going to putty the holes again in x number of months. It’s easy to want to throw in the towel on good habits and good work when you meet resistance to them at evert turn. And when our own life is difficult, we are especially prone to everyone else-ism — assuming everyone else must possess some magical quality that makes their life easier2.
Recently I’ve been wondering if I have this whole concept flipped upside down. What if the point of work is not what I produce, but what the work produces in me?
Up until this year I hadn’t really encountered the virtues, (as in the four cardinal virtues: prudence, temperance, justice and fortitude) much. I was vaguely familiar with them, but in my mind I think I conceptualized virtue in a similar realm as being the type of person who uses their own bags at the grocery store.3 What’s starting to crystallize is that virtue is not a check box to be completed, but a muscle to be strengthened. Thus, our daily habits are always going to be leading towards greater virtue or away from it.
If I’m looking at my life from this framework, I can be strengthened to begin good habits again, even, and especially, when I seem to fall down as often as I get up. I do not have the luxury of a predictable schedule, regular sleep, or long, uninterrupted stretches of time for deep work. If I lose track of my ultimate goal it’s incredibly easy to flounder and give up. I easily become disoriented if I forget what matters.
A tool that has been very helpful in this practice is the “Tending List” from Powersheets. Two years ago I ordered the whole planner, and while it was beautiful, I barely touched most of it. What I did use was the sheet that asked me to choose monthly and weekly action items along with daily habits. This allowed me to set big picture goals, knowing that a month was a manageable time frame in which to look ahead. I also chose things I wanted to focus on weekly and chose daily habits to practice. There are little bars off to the side that show visual progress and an individual box to check off each habit for each day of the month4. I’ve carried this practice over and try to set up a new sheet at the beginning of each month.
So, for example, the daily habits I’ve chosen for January are all things I know affect my wellbeing, how well our day functions, my physical health or my momentum. They are boring:
eat 20g of protein before 10 AM
drink one mason jar of water before noon
go to bed by 10:30
wake up by 6:305
take morning supplements
stay logged out of Substack til 1 pm
keep Safari off my phone6
These are all things I know help me, but easily fall by the wayside because they feel too small to be impactful. When I write them down, incentivized by a checkbox to do them, they are building blocks for the rest of the day.
I could set a more impressive and idealistic goal, like “quiet writing time every morning”. But, knowing both myself and my children I’m likely to be frustrated by this goal. Instead if I choose a smaller goalpost that sets the conditions for what I want to happen, while removing distractions7 it’s more likely to be successful. The bar for crossing it off is lower, the success more easily snowballs and I gain momentum.
Similarly, if you have small children, you will understand how difficult it is to feed yourself and drink water. I can easily look up at 11 AM and remember I haven’t eaten yet — though the headache and irritability should be enough to clue me in. And I’m even more capable of getting to bedtime without drinking anything besides tea and coffee. Again, prudence has shown me that me being fed and hydrated serves the highest good of my family, even though the time it takes to eat etc… often feels annoying, pointless, or competes with something I’d rather do.
When it comes to monthly and weekly goals they are similarly lackluster. Over the summer I had “do something in garden 2x a week” as my benchmark, knowing that my biggest barrier was just making myself go outside — once I got there, I would figure out something to do and enjoy it. And even if I couldn’t do much, I could still check it off. Maintaining momentum and consistency is more important than feeling impressive.
When I stay focused on the outcome of the goal, I am apt to be disappointed. If I can focus on the process part of the goal — the part I have control over — then no matter what the outcome actually is I will know I’ve done my best to be faithful. In setting goals for myself, I am learning the thing I want to measure is my faithfulness, not the end product. But so often it’s the faithfulness in the small things that leads to the end result anyway. Without the faithful steps that don’t feel like much, you won’t get to anything bigger.
Committing to “do something with the starter” for a month led to a year of baking gluten free bread for my family.
Committing to “spend time in the garden 2x a week” gave us produce through two summers, despite morning sickness and a small baby.
“10 minutes of PT exercises every day” helped me feel functional postpartum.
Having a “bare minimum” check list has kept us moving through schoolwork throughout many transitions.
“Bible time with the boys” staying on my to-do list item for the last five years means they now remind me if I forget, and we’ve read through eight of Paul’s epistles this fall.
Working towards greater virtue provides a framework for repetition that is not insulting. We are able to put our best effort towards repetitive tasks without succumbing to the lie that tells us they are pointless.
As I think about this framework, I am reminded that we are in a battle against goodness, truth and beauty. The metaphor of a garden and the weeds that so easily overtake it might fall a little flat in Colorado, where spontaneous weeds aren’t quite as much of an issue. But when we traveled to the south this last summer I stared at the kudzu vines that draped from every tree. This invasive species can grow up to a foot a day, a fact that boggled my mind. If we imagine our vices as kudzu and developing virtue the clearing of the brush, perhaps we can understand why, despite our efforts and intentions we so often feel the battle is pointless. But think of what would happen if you chose not to fight it at all? As I think of the repetition that is built into liturgy and the church year, it seems obvious that God is not concerned about us needing to do the same thing over and over. If in our worship we are content to return every year to the same cycles, why do we grow so frustrated with this pattern in our daily life? Is it simply the nature of being human, that we easily forget and must frequently return? And is it this return, repentance if you will, that grows both our faith and our faithfulness? I think so.
In this particular season of my life I often return to Paul’s words to the Galatians,
And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.
Galatians 6:9-10 ESV
I know how easy it is to grow weary, but this —whatever task you’ve been given — is strength training for virtue. You won’t find me in a gym this January, but I will be working muscles of a different sort.
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Lately:
Listening: This podcast episode by Sally Clarkson dovetails nicely and spurred on some of the thinking in this post. On a COMPLETELY different note, I had a run in with Olivia Rodrigo thanks to the
podcast. I didn’t know that my fifteen year old self needed to feel those feelings 😂. I’ve also been listening to music or podcasts with headphones while I make dinner. Everyone has been home and inside a lot, so by the end of the day sometimes the noise — even when it’s just normal, kids being kids, playing and happy noise — makes me want to run out of the building screaming. This makes me feel anti-social but is better than being irritable with everyone.8Reading: I did it! I finished the Flannery O’Connor collection (A Good Man is Hard to Find) I did not love all of them, I’m not even sure I loved most of them. But I think I get it. By the end they were starting to make sense. I think my favorites were, “A Stroke of Good Fortune” and “ The Displaced Person”. I just began Demon Copperhead and decided to re-read Pride and Prejudice. The Soul of Shame got returned to Libby halfway through, so I guess I’ll finish that whenever I can get it back. Keeping Safari off my phone helps my reading habits significantly. I can get a few chapters in while I’m nursing the baby if I can stay off the world wide web.
Related to today’s post: Goals Not Resolutions by
, Why Things Work or Don’t by and Write Your Rule Before You Make Your Rules byCooking: I am, to put it mildly, unenthused. If you happen to have some magical recipe that is nightshade, dairy, nut, egg, and grain free and actually tastes good send it my way. I am also accepting applications for a meal fairy.
Homeschool: We’ll start up again next week. I am not ready. I never am, but I think it will be good to get in a routine. Here’s hoping. I’ve read a few pieces recently about taking January as a slow month and not overwhelming our children by trying to be our best homeschool selves right off the bat. This seems wise. It’s dark and cold and I could be persuaded to hibernate if that were an option.
I hope your 2024 is off to a manageable start with a hint of optimism, however that may look for you!
I have one isolated memory of hiding behind a chair in the living room and my mom asking me why I was up. I imagine now that she was both exasperated by my early rising and anticipating how GRUMPY I was going to be. In payment for my past deeds, I now have early rising children who are awake at the same time as I am no matter what.
I did it this week — whined about how I couldn’t get into a morning routine because I have a million bajillion kids and no one sleeps and blah blah blah. It’s real. And it’s not particularly helpful. You and I both may have a million bajillion kids, or some equally tasking thing that feels insurmountable, but it doesn’t serve me well to fight reality. I try, trust me. But magical thinking hasn’t ever produced magic.
Honestly, it could be. But not because in a nebulous, “this makes me a good person way”, it’s virtuous because if you are able, it allows you to work on being prudent, thinking ahead, not being wasteful. Re-using something is acting justly towards material goods. However, it could be just as virtuous to discern that prudence dictates you using more plastic bags than you’d prefer at grocery pickup is a wise choice because it provides you with bandwidth to be kinder to your children in the course of a day. Then you have the issue of virtue signaling and the false dichotomy we’ve built around proving to others that we are good people, which is mostly based on how what we do makes people feel. If the prophets, apostles and history are any indication, virtue is often unpopular.
Your mileage may vary here. I am a checkbox person. I love me a dopamine hit of checking something off a list. I will put things I have done on the list just to check them off. I am learning though, to make my lists much more realistic. I also use a paper planner that has a simple layout: each day has a page, there’s a top three for each weekday, time on one side, checkboxes on the other side and a box below for meal ideas. It’s very similar to this one.
I feel the need to say: my baby is 10 months old and sleeping *better* at night, in addition to taking slightly more predictable naps. This means that if she sleeps poorly and I get up early, I will most likely have a chance to nap. Until this is a more predictable reality I just sleep when I can. First year of baby’s life is just catch as you can for me.
Go to screen time→content and privacy restrictions→ allowed apps→ toggle safari off. This is the equivalent of deleting an app. You can reinstall it easily if you NEED it, but you have to make the choice to do so. It’s a helpful boundary.
What are the two barriers to entry here? My kids clamor for food as soon as I’m up if it’s any later than 7 AM, I get sucked in by my phone and comments/articles and my attention is hijacked for the morning. If I don’t start with the dopamine hit I’m much less distracted the rest of the day.
Related… I have a pair of the Loop earplugs, and they’re ok, but they kind of make me feel like I’m underwater. I do notice that if I put them in I’m calmer almost immediately, but it’s also nice to have a chance to listen to things without being interrupted 🤷♀️.
I just kept nodding in agreement while reading this, Annelise. I love the idea of moving towards a virtue instead of reaching for an ultimate end goal. Learning to love the process is something that's been on my heart lately, as well, and you've captured it so beautifully here.
I so enjoyed reading this! It’s great to hear about your process and focus more on the becoming than the outcome. And gosh, the “is it worth it because we might move in x months?” question is near and dear for me. I’ve never spent more than 5 consecutive years in the same house, ever. And mostly no more than 2. It’s exhausting. Well done for doing it with small children!