A daily checklist is a beneficial tool, that at first can be frustrating and cumbersome. After continual usage, however, you will find that using this monitoring tool on a regular basis is fun and encouraging. Using this habit-forming tool to your advantage will lead you towards becoming that person you want to be.
Daily checklists are not for the light-hearted. They require continuous action throughout the day since habit development requires a conscious effort. In other words, the checklists need to be in the front of your mind. Placing them in every room of your house will help.
For instance, I want to teach my kids the habit of making their bed everyday. So, I have a daily checklist with ‘bed making’ as a task posted on their bedroom door. I also have Velcroed a magic marker next to it so I don’t hear any excuses about how they couldn’t write it down because they did not have a pen or pencil. No excuses are allowed when developing new, positive habits. That is an important reminder for anyone wanting to change unwanted behavior into more beneficial actions.
The first thing you need to do to develop a daily checklist is find some alone time. You need to sit down in a quiet area and give some serious thought to what exactly you want to accomplish. For instance, what areas of your life need changed? Do you want to become more organized? Eat a healthy meal plan? Change your thinking pattern from negative to positive? Or, maybe you want to start getting more physical activity into your daily life. No matter what area is involved, you need to know your goals before moving forward.
You need to start out slowly when first working on developing new habits. Choose only a few unwanted behaviors you want to change. Changing unwanted behavior and developing positive habits takes hard work and time involvement. Starting out small is always a good idea since it prevents feeling overwhelmed. When you feel overwhelmed, your chances of accomplishing your goals dramatically decrease.
Think of it, if you have 15 unwanted behaviors that you want to change on a daily basis, how troublesome can it appear when you cannot figure out which one to start with? Starting with only a few goals will not put you into that situation. You need to start slowly. As you become more adept at using the daily checklist process, then you can advance to adding more potential habits.
After you understand your behavior goals, you need to develop a daily checklist. A daily checklist contains a number of essential items to guide you towards your positive behavior change. Make a list of your behavior goals, also known as tasks. When performed enough time, tasks become habits. Once you have this list, you need to develop a spreadsheet as a tracking device. The spreadsheet contains all the essential elements including a page title of “Daily Checklist”, and columns with headings of Tasks, starting date and each day of the week. I always find putting the title in bold letters helps stimulate me to perform the needed task. It, for some reason, provides a sense of accomplishment and encourages me towards performing my task.
Some people may like having the days listed as Monday, Tuesday, etc. Others may find it helpful to use the calendar dates of 01/01/01, etc. It depends upon your personal need. In addition to doing this with your own paper and pen, there are numerous habit tracking or daily checklists forms you can find online that use software effortlessly. You do not even need a lot of computer experience to use them since they are very user-friendly.
Daily checklists can be used throughout your home for different areas of your life. Let’s say you want to develop healthier eating habits. You can post a daily checklist in your kitchen area to remind yourself of the behaviors you want to become part of your life. Post this checklist to your refrigerator.
For instance, you want to start eating five or more servings of vegetables and fruits daily. Put this on the checklist and put your checklist on your refrigerator at eye-level view. Placing the checklist at this level makes it impossible to miss seeing. For extra convenience, attach a writing utensil on a string next to your list.
Every time you open the refrigerator, you will be reminded of your future habits. This place is also the perfect recording site. Every time you open the refrigerator and take out a fruit or vegetable and eat it, simply check off on your daily checklist that you accomplished that goal.
If you keep a fruit or vegetable bowl on your kitchen counter top, make certain it is close to your refrigerator to increase your recording convenience level.
Daily checklists are more than to-do lists. Daily checklists are lists of tasks you need to accomplish to develop positive habits. To-do lists involve listing items you want to accomplish throughout the day. Both are reminders about what you want to accomplish, but one is used to develop positive habits while the other may not necessarily help develop new habits. To-do lists can just put you through the motions of surviving in everyday life. Daily checklists provide the foundation for improving your life.
Using this habit-forming tool to your advantage will lead you towards becoming that person you want to be.
