The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
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Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
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Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
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Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
Jump in the discussion.
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Notes -
Goals for last month didn't go particularly well. Got about 1/4: I was very social and even hosted a tapas dinner party with 12 guests at my house! I continued to scroll too much, masturbate/use porn and multitask at work. I think the social goal clicked for me (while the others didn't) because I had an actionable system to follow (go to this activity on this night, make plans with these friends this weekend), while the others didn't because I didn't have a system in place to keep me accountable and/or make the goals actionable. For this month I want to focus on systems:
Reducing scrolling. I have cold turkey on my computer and a lock box for my phone. I can pre-decide what sites/apps are allowed during what times on my computer using cold turkey and don't have to use willpower to stick to it. Same with the phone, although I have to exercise my willpower to put the thing in the box at the set time. This isn't nothing, but is much easier than constantly trying to resist the siren call of the device.
Scheduling free time and lab time. This is a Cal Newport suggestion. I found my reading habit wasn't as consistent as I would have liked, and am now trying to juggle Spanish, Italian, and English reading, as well as books for various book clubs (Marx, Kant, Spanish book club, etc.). The same applies for my lab work: when I need to do bench experiments they need to be planned out in advance. I can't just decide to a dissection Thursday afternoon because I need to prep, dissections+staining take 5-6 hours, and there's circadian rhythm effects that I have to keep track of between experiments. Of course the schedule doesn't need to be a prison, which I think Jordan Peterson has said, but it can be a guide. Spontaneity is heavily overrated.
Making sure I sleep enough 5/7 nights a week (preferably 6/7). I'm running about 80 miles/a week these days, and I need to sleep well to recover. Plus everything (willpower, intelligence, emotional regulation, social IQ) seems to get better when I sleep more. Aiming for between 8.5-9 hours in bed 6/7 nights of the week, with one night a little more flexible for late social events. This does mean saying no to a few things, but it mainly means not procrastinating with scrolling and eating properly so I don't wake up in the middle of the night.
Impressive. That's a lot. I'm at half that, and with a lifting schedule too, I go to bed feeling beat up most days.
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