Keep On Keeping On
This slogan acts as a reminder to keep on doing the daily practices that you know work to help you stay balanced in the day.
I find it so easy to start something with a flourish and say to myself I’m going to do a reading from a daily reflections book and a meditation every morning because they make me feel so much better in myself.
Or I say to myself that I’m going to have a walk every day because I feel the effect of the endorphins afterwards, those feel-good chemicals that flood my body when I’m active.
I mean well and usually do these things for a few days and then the commitment weakens and my mind says – well you tried that and it didn’t work so well. Or something else gets in the way. After a while I’ve managed to provide every excuse as to why I’m not doing what works for my mental well-being.
And yet I know that being persistent – keeping going - is the key, and if I do this for long enough, even when my mind tells me the opposite - then the habit is created. This is when I experience the benefits of doing what works for me, as a natural occurrence rather than an unpleasant chore. As a result, I am more likely to reap the rewards in my mental outlook on life.
This works in the same way that drops of rain, over the years, can wear small grooves and holes into a stone. The drip-drip effect.
Daily practice is the way that we can learn to play an instrument. The art of repetition, keeping on keeping on, day after day gets the book written. It is the same with our mental well-being, which too requires daily maintenance and practice.
That’s why I write these blogs about tools I use to help me stay well. They act as a constant reminder of what works.
When I first attended 12 step groups to stop my addictive drinking, I was very arrogant. I knew I was a fast learner, so I expected to pick up the tools quickly, buy the book, watch the video, and be well again in a matter of months. Job done.
When I heard people in the rooms talk about their years of sobriety and how long they’d been attending the meetings, I felt sorry for them, judging them as slow learners. I’m 32 years sober today and still practice the steps required on a daily basis to remind me of what works.
I’ve discovered the hard way that the only way forward, on the path of staying well, with my head above water, is to use my well-being tools daily, stick to my resolve and be persistent. Just like those drops of rain. The drip-drip effect works.
A word of caution – it’s important to be sure that we are choosing to be persistent with actions that are actually going to have a positive effect. There is no point pushing away at the boulder we simply cannot move. The serenity prayer comes in here – to accept the things we cannot change and instead focus on the things we can actually do something about. When facing a task that on the surface seems overwhelming, I break the whole thing down into small steps and then that day just start with the first one and then the second and eventually with persistence the job is completed – the hole is made in the stone.
I also use the technique that I learned from reading an excellent book by Caroline Buchanan, ‘The 15 minute Rule’ which reminded me of the significance of breaking things down into small yet consistent actions. I can do something for 15 mins each day, which seems manageable and eventually the task is complete.
When we decided to move home again, I was faced with the job of clearing a vast number of boxes and bags of paperwork that had accumulated from several moves and many years of different careers, all of which I thought would be useful one day. After 10 years I still hadn’t sifted through them and the prospect seemed daunting. So, I set about just doing 15 minutes of sorting each day and eventually the garage was cleared. The house move became so much easier as a result.
Being persistent, with constant repetition, otherwise known as ‘keeping on keeping on’ with the things we know work for us, are without doubt practices that benefit our daily mental health and well-being. Remember the power of the drip-drip effect.