What went well today?

A few years ago I found myself not only grieving the death of my father but also recovering from cancer and dealing with a whole bunch of other problems that life had decided to bring to me, all at the same time. Life, it seemed, was awful.

So I decided to start a new habit. I set a reminder on my phone for the end of each day to ask myself one simple question:

“What went well today?”

At first, my answers probably wouldn’t have impressed to you at all. They were things like “Managed to walk 50 metres,” “Met up with a friend,” or “Went outside and saw a beautiful sunset.” But at the time, even these were huge advances for me. Reminding myself of them helped me to keep going. And as I recovered from the cancer and moved on with my life, so my answers to this daily question shifted and grew. Last year, for example, I walked over 50 kilometres in a day.

Years later, this timely reminder is still on my phone. Because, with hindsight, asking myself this simple question at the end of each day has brought me three very powerful and valuable things:

1. It reminds me what is going well in my life, as well as what is going badly. This gives me a more balanced perspective, which improves my morale.
2. It reminds me of what is important to me, which helps me to decide my priorities for tomorrow and next week, which means I end up doing more of the things I value most, which again improves my morale and creates a virtuous, self-reinforcing circle.
3. It trains me to look past the ‘problems’ to find the opportunities in a situation: it strengthens the key attitude of leadership in me, every day.

With hindsight, this apparently simple process has actually been transformative — a major contribution to my becoming more antifragile. It enables me to focus my energies on not only what is going well but also on what could go even better.

I recommend it to you.

Is your current life perfect? Do you take the time to remember what is going well, as well as what is going badly? Would it be useful to set a reminder on your phone at the end of each day to ask yourself, “What went well today?”?

Adapted from Inner Leadership: a framework and tools for building inspiration in times of change.

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Photo By Kevin Gale via StockPholio.net