Description: This episode invites you to explore a simple 30-day challenge to add joy, ease, or intention to your December without adding to your to-do list.
Resources: Ted Talk by Matt Cutts
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Transcription: Hi, and welcome to Self-Care for Educators. I am your host, Tina Boogrin. This is episode 13 of season five, and it will come out on December 1st. And when I noticed that I immediately knew what I wanted this week's invitation to be. So here's my suggestion. I want you to consider a 30 day challenge that you can do in December.
Now hear me out. Some of you may have just heard that and you panicked. It was like, “I have too much to do in December anyway!” It can be the most delicious challenge ever. And if challenge doesn't feel like the right word, I don't know, maybe there's a better word. I'm a little brain dead myself, so I'm having trouble thinking of one, but just a 30 day commitment or promise that you make to yourself. Something that you are going to do or not do, but I kind of think it's easier to think of something you're going to do for 30 days, starting today. Now, if you happen to be listening to this later in the week, Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, I just gave you like a free spot. Mark off the first few days of the month and just start where you are right now. In fact, there's 31 days in December, so you kind of get a bonus day anyway.
The idea of 30 Day Challenges comes from Matt Cutts’, fantastic TED Talk, that's quite a few years old now. I think it came out in 2011. You can look it up. It's a pretty short TED Talk. Some of you have seen it in my workshops. And it's just the idea. He did this. He spent, I think it was a year, and he just engaged in a different 30 day challenge each month. So it was either something he was adding to his life, or something he was going to stop doing for 30 days.
And I've shared this at various workshops and presentations, and what's fascinating is this resonates with people big time. And I think there's something about, just 30 days feels doable. It can be a really good jumpstart and it's tapping into that research that reminds us that it's really powerful to start something and keep it going because we get to the place where we don't want to break the chain, right? If we've done something for 17 days, we don't want to miss it. And that's part of the 30 day challenge.
So you might spend a little time doing a little brainstorming. And here's what I'm going to encourage- that you make it small and doable and something you look forward to as a way to carry you through this incredibly challenging month. And think about what your, what your month looks like so that this feels reasonable.
So as you're winding up this semester or quarter or however it works, your calendar year at school, it's going to get busy and crazy. You got holiday stuff going on and then you're about to go on break and um, in the month of December. And I know break can sometimes feel even harder with all the responsibilities. So knowing, you know yourself best to know what your December looks like and thinking about what would feel really, really good that you can do every single day for 30 days starting a new habit.
I have some thoughts on this. So maybe you're going to take a walk every day. Um, maybe you're going to read every day, like some sort of a fiction, something you're looking forward to. Maybe you're going to write down one thing that you're grateful for. Like think of some of these past invitations that we've shared and is there something that you want to pull back or revisit or start fresh?
Maybe you're going to take a gratitude photo every single day. Maybe you're going to eat an apple every single day. Maybe you are going to text a different person and give them a little love note every day. Maybe you're going to do something together as a family every day in December, or as a class for as many days As you are together in December, or as a staff, or with your professional learning community.
Just do a little brainstorming. And if you go like online, you can see, Pinterest is what I'm thinking of. I've gone there before and tons of people will post ideas around different 30 day challenges because sometimes we kind of get stuck. And I know I give you the same ideas all the time because I get stuck too. So maybe you do a quick little search there to get an idea and just do some general brainstorming and then discover what would feel really good.
Maybe you're going to treat yourself in some way every single day. Maybe it's a commitment to go to bed at a certain time. Or you're going to watch one holiday special, um, as a family each night. Maybe that feels like too much, but always, always, always remember, make the invitation work for you. So maybe you don't do it every single day. Maybe you do it like every Saturday of the month or every Sunday of the month, or just on weekdays, or just on weekends, lots of ways that you can kind of play with the idea of a 30 day challenge.
And as I said, I like the idea of adding something to our lives. But of course you can, you can stop doing something for 30 days and see how that feels. That one gets a little trickier because I always think of things like when we want to change habits of like, I don't know, giving up sugar or giving up caffeine. And I don't know if December is the month that you want to do that, but you might be able to think of something else that you can reasonably give up or stop doing for the month of December.
And think also about, is there something you can do in December that will jumpstart your thinking ahead to All the New Year's resolutions and intentions and things that we set in 2025. I know that some of you are probably big time New Year's resolution people and some of you are not. And everything in between. But I always like that idea and I'm sure we'll revisit it, of thinking about how you want to feel as you end this year and how you want to feel as you start next year. And so maybe by thinking of that end result, you can back it up and implement some sort of 30 day challenge or 30 day invitation or 30 day adventure that can help you feel however it is that you decide you want to feel at the end of the year or to start the new year.
So that's what I want you to play around with. I'm still thinking about what I'm going to do. I just got really excited when I was like, oh, it's time to record the podcast. When is this coming out? Oh, it will come out on the first and I love a fresh new month and it's the last month of the year and it's a Sunday when this comes out and so I thought this will be a good thing for us to play with.
So I'm going to be, I'm going to be playing with this as well. So think about what can you do every single day? Or what can you stop doing every single day for the month of December that would feel really, really good to you? Like I said, I encourage you to make it something you look forward to, something small, so small that you can't not do it. We don't want to add to your already, already full plate and long to-do list. We want it to feel like a treat, some way that you, you treat yourself, something you look forward to that you kind of get a jumpstart on that this month.
Amazing. As always, we're so grateful for you, Adrienne. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the work you do behind the scenes to make this happen. Thank you to Solution Tree and Marzano Resources. I can't believe I'm closing on another year with both of these amazing companies. I feel so grateful. And to you, my badass self care squad, may we move into December thinking about how we can support ourselves through this month. As you do this, feel my hand on your back. Know that you got a whole, whole crew cheering for you. We've got this.
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