Breaking My 3 Year Streaks
For the past several years, I’ve used an app called Streaks to track a variety of daily goals. Completing this daily checklist (which includes tasks like recording a one-second video, reading a book, or closing my Apple Watch activity rings) are really important to me, and having a streak that I don’t want to break encourages me to stick to my goals, even when it’s inconvenient or I’m feeling lazy. But today, I’m making the difficult decision to retire two of my health-based Streaks.
For over 3 and a half years (as of today, that’s 1,298 days), I’ve brushed my teeth three times a day—no exceptions. It’s not uncommon for me to carry a toothbrush around with me, and I can often be found brushing in a public restroom, in the bathroom of someone’s house at a party, or even in a car (side note: never spit toothpaste out of a moving vehicle, unless you want the car to look like it’s the most popular bird toilet in town).
I’ve also been drinking at least 100 ounces of water, every single day, for the past 867 days (that’s about 2 and a half years). Before I gave myself a daily goal, I just didn’t drink much water throughout the day, and now that I do, I can feel and notice the benefits. But the health benefits of that daily goal comes with two downsides: I am forced to meticulously track my daily water intake, so I can be sure I’m reaching my goal, and I have to pee…a lot.
On a recent trip to visit some friends, both of these goals got in my way of having a good time, and both were more inconvenient than they were helpful. While my wife, friends, and I were enjoying Disney World and beach days, I was holding everyone up while I searched for a place for my mid-day teeth cleaning. I also was constantly on the lookout for places to refill my water bottle or empty my bladder, causing detours and delays while we made our way around the theme parks, beaches, and other adventures. And when we all went out to see a movie, I had to excuse myself from the movie TWICE to use the restroom (despite going right before it started!).
And the truth is: skipping one or two post-lunch teeth-brushing isn’t going to cause a cavity, and having only 75 ounces of water one day isn’t going to leave me dehydrated. I realized the goals had become more about extending the streak than about doing what was best for me.
I also believe that the efforts and routines I’ve built over the past few years won’t go away if stop counting everything. Going forward, I predict I’ll still brush my teeth 3 times almost every day, and most days, I’ll probably still consume 100 ounces of water. After all, the point of the Streaks app and the daily checklist is to build daily habits, so that they become second nature.
Since these habits are now ingrained, I can still carry them forward on my own, without having to be so strict with myself about completing them every single day. So, as of today, I’ll be replacing them with new, but related, habits I want to build. Instead of forcing myself to brush 3 times a day without exception, I’ll start a new goal of flossing at least 5 times a week: this is still related to oral health and hygiene, it’s a habit I need to get better at, and I’m already giving myself a bit of flexibility by only requiring it 5 times per week, so I don’t have to be so stressed. I’m also adding the goal of only consuming 1 soda per day. Part of the reason I started drinking more water was so that I would stop drinking so much sugar. So to make sure I don’t end up slacking on water and filling the gap with something unhealthy, I’m setting a limit on my Dr. Pepper intake.
The whole point of setting daily goals has been to build healthy habits that make my life easier. I hope these new goals will help me build new healthy habits, while allowing me to relax a little bit more (and maybe pee a little bit less).
