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 once. Life, it seemed, was absolutely dreadful.

And so I decided to begin a new habit.

I set a reminder on my phone for the end of each day to ask myself a simple question:

“What went well today?”

At first, my answers probably wouldn’t have impressed you. They were things like “Managed to walk 50 metres,” “Met up with a friend,” or “Saw a beautiful sunset.” But at the time, even these were huge achievements 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: a couple of years ago I managed to walk over 50 kilometres in a day, twice.

So years later, this reminder is still on my phone. Because with hindsight, asking myself this very 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 set my priorities for tomorrow, next week, and next month, 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 any situation: it strengthens in me the key attitude of leadership, every day

With hindsight, this apparently simple process has actually been transformative — a major contribution to my becoming more antifragile.

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