About small victories and survival

When I was first furloughed at the end of April, for two weeks, I did nothing. And that was cool. Then it got boring, tiring and damaging to do nothing. I had all the time in the world, something I had never experienced before, as even at Uni I spent my summers working. As I found out, time can be overwhelming.

I had so many things I wanted to do and try. It took me a few weeks until I managed to find the right balance for me. Again, for the first time probably since high-school (that's 7 years peeps), I finally had a routine: I got up in the morning early, did some online learning, smashed through some job applications or worked on my CV, cooked lunch (I skip breakfast even on a good day, it is all about the 2 cups of coffee and the biscuits in the morning), watched something while I ate and the food was settling, then I went for a run and worked out for another 1-2hours. My evenings were for socialising in the house and doing my crafting. And this was almost every day, without a fail. Sometimes I worked out more, sometimes I just went for a big walk with my friend. I achieved a lot, I had fun, I felt happy and myself.

2nd lockdown came around, and I was in a different environment, I was isolating with my partner (to be fair, I am not complaining about spending time with him, whatsoever) in one small room. This time around, we knew it was only few weeks, it felt very temporary. I struggled with being locked in. I felt like I was wasting my days. Even though I knew I wasn't just lounging all day, somehow, I still had nothing to show for it.

So, you know, I had to change that. I created a Victory Tracker (VT), think of it as the love child of a habit tracker, a journal and has a hint of gratitude to it. This is how it works:

The tracker is based on weekly frequency, which allows you to have more active and more passive days within a week, but discourages longer periods of inactivity.

You set a goal of victories before your week begins. This can change from week to week, based on your availability, motivation, drive or mood. Having an overall weekly goal and not a daily one also supports the previous point of having a balance.

Rewards are so important. I grew up in a Montessori environment, rewarding methods were different from the standard. I find that naming a reward to work towards is basically just transforming that weekly goal number into something desirable.

I categorised activities in life that I found essential: my career, my environment, my health, my sanity, my loved ones and my self-expression. Breaking it down into categories helps realising the diversity a day can bring. It's up to the person what to include, how little and in which aspect. Taking the dog for a walk one day can have the importance of exercise but the next day, you just really needed to clear your head and your thoughts, and see it as self-care. I use the tracker to kick-off habits like taking my vitamins daily, the initial excitement of counting as a victory will eventually wear off and will not count as a victory - as it will be something standard, like taking a shower. Don't get me wrong, I can think of many times in my life, when getting out of bed and taking a shower seemed like an impossible task. I should have celebrated myself for doing so in those times, but I guess, I didn't have a VT then.

Although rewards and goals are great, I didn't want the VT to turn me into an overworked maniac, who once fails to achieve the set numbers and therefore feels like a loser, completely missing the original purpose of the tracker: to recognise all the things I did, not the things I could have done. Hence, I had to include the most important achievement of all: getting through another bloody week. Set a high goal, something happened halfway through the week and all I did is spend 3 days cuddling my cat? So what? I got through from Monday to Sunday, and clearly I needed those 3 points of self-care. Those are also victories. Because looking after ourselves is necessary. Because surviving is good enough.

So now, lockdown #3, I am going to try again. I might not be as effective as I was in April, but for sure I want to feel better about myself than I did just before Christmas. I wanted to share the VT. Because you might need it, or know someone who needs it. Use it, check-in with yourself, with each other, celebrate the little victories in life, and survive. That is all ever expected of you.