The Challenge: January 1–31, 2015
For the entire month of January, we are challenging ourselves to making something every day. The goal is consistency—making a habit of making.
Daily from Seth Godin’s Blog
“There’s a fundamental difference between the things you do every day, every single day, and the things you do only when the spirit moves you. One difference is that once you’ve committed to doing something daily, you find that the spirit moves you, daily. Rather than having a daily debate about today’s agenda, you can decide once that you will do something, and then decide every single day how to do it.” 12/21/2014
Making Something Every Day
In the spirit of developing good habits of making something every day, even if the spirit doesn’t show up, here’s the challenge:
- One: pick a single discipline for the challenge. For example, if you want to develop photography skills, take a photo every day. The idea is to help you get better at something.
- Small: commit to something small. For example, if you want to develop writing skills, write something short every day. Don’t bite off more than you can chew.
- Posting: we will be posting our creations for others in the group to see. This accountability helps, and it’s useful to trace your progress throughout the challenge.
- Rest: feel free to take one day off each week. Even God rested on the seventh day.
Resistance
If you are like me, you probably already sensed some resistance to this idea. Here are some voices I just heard as I wrote this:
- I’m not a very consistent person—I probably will poop out half way through.
- I’m rusty.
- What if I do something that isn’t very good? How embarrassing.
- This is going to cost me something. It takes time, and time is money. Is it worth it?
If you hear voices like that, then maybe you should listen to them and not sign up. Or maybe you will decide not to let them limit you, that it’s better to make something than nothing, and that this could be an interesting learning experience. Either decision is fine.
Showing Up
Woody Allen once said, “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” The goal of this challenge is not to produce something amazing. It’s rather to show up and put something out there every day regardless of the quality, just for the practice of developing the habit.
Prize
Anyone who completes the challenge every day, or is the most consistent in the group, wins a prize.
Participants
Here’s who is participating in the challenge so far. Click to see each person’s creative contribution:
