Predictable: Predictable Habits for an Unpredictable Life

The other night, I was reading, for the second go around, Atomic Habits by James Clear. If you’re not familiar with Clear’s work, especially this book, I highly recommend you pick it up and give it a gander. It’s an easy read, especially for the topic, which discusses our habits, both good and bad, and Clear provides strategies to either help build or eliminate based on our goals. As I was saying, this is my second reading of this book, one of the few books that I will re-read. If you’re wondering why I’m re-reading it, I’ve felt that since my last consumption of it, over two years ago, I have been struggling to build new, positive habits in my life. Atomic Habits helped me in the past and I have no doubts that it will once again. 

As I was reading and highlighting key takeaways, my wife looked over at me and asked, “What are you reading now?” About a week prior, I finished my first book of 2025, Fight Club, by Chuck Palahniuk. Fight Club is another book I have re-read. In fact, for the past five years, it has been the very book I read to kick off each new year. I look over my left shoulder, holding my blue highlighter between the index and middle finger in my right hand like a cigarette, and respond, “Atomic Habits. It’s about strategies to build positive habits and eliminate bad ones.” With her book resting on her lap, she slowly began turning her head to look forward, away from me, picks up her book, shakes her head and says, “Didn’t you already read that? You’re so predictable,” and continued to bury herself back into her book. 

I’ve contemplated this comment, “You’re so predictable,” for the past few days and realized that is exactly what I want with what goals I’m striving for. In order to build positive habits, we need to be predictable. Some may feel that being predictable leads to a boring life, no spontaneity, but I disagree. I feel that being predictable is a key ingredient for an exciting life, a life made of crushing goals and living in what many only have as dreams. 

James Clear obviously says it much better than me, he is the “Habit Expert,” but basically, creating positive habits won’t happen by simply wishing them into existence. We can say all we want of what we want to do, what we want to accomplish, but unless we put the work forth those wants are just daydreams. Positive habits need to be built into our lives with cues, support, a shift in mindset, and habit stacking. Again, I’m not going to try and explain the process and benefits of Atomic Habits, so please pick up the book and give it a read yourself, you won’t be disappointed. 

By being predictable, I know what habits throughout my day are going to happen. These are habits that I have put in place to reach the goals I have set for myself. Here’s a rough breakdown of a perfect day implementing my habits: 

5:00 Am Wakeup

Hydrate

Coffee

Prayer

Daily Stoic

Journal/reflection

Minimum 30 minutes of movement (lifting, running, or cycling)

Visit 3 classrooms

Complete tasks on my 3 item “To Do” list

Family time

Read

Sleep

These are the non-negotiables that I strive to get done each and every day. Of course, not every day is perfect, but there are definitely more days than not that I accomplish each habit. For the days that I don’t, tomorrow is a new day and I work to be 1% better than the day before. 

Being an elementary principal, husband, and father of a 13 and 16 year old, the times in between my habits are far from predictable. It’s the predictability of my daily habits that keep me grounded, focused, and working towards my goals and prepare me to take on all of the unpredictability of my predictable life. 

***

Pick up my book, The Educulture Cookbook: Recipes & Dishes to Positively Transform Classroom & School Culture with EduMatch Publishing.

Start Today!

 

It has been some time since I’ve sat down and put my thoughts to paper, well screen, in the form of a blog. To be honest, it’s been 270 days. I wish I had some great explanation as to why I haven’t been writing. Why I wrote two blogs within two days of each other, submitted one to Teach Better, Time for an Upgrade, and then just sat on the other. The only reasoning I can muster up as to why I haven’t been doing one of my favorite forms of self-care is because I just haven’t been disciplined. Like with any habit, good or bad, the less it is practiced the less it becomes a staple of our lives. That is going to be my goal for 2025: building habits through discipline as to what brings me joy, peace, happiness, and a clear mind. 2025 is going to not only be the year that I get back to being me, but transforming into a new me, the me that I know I can, and should have been, all this time.

Now I know what you’re thinking, I sound like every hopeful individual setting lofty goals for the New Year. I don’t disagree, I do. And you’re thinking, I probably make goals like this this time of year EVERY year, and if they stuck, I wouldn’t be setting the same, or similar goals, every year. And again, you’re correct. But the difference this time, this year, is my mindset. I’m fed up with not doing what makes me happy. I’m exhausted with feeling exhausted, pretending to take care of myself when it’s not even coming close to 70% of the time. I’m done with not living up to my potential and setting a better example for my kids. I’m done with the old Mike, the Mike that has spent the past 44 years half-assing his way through life, getting lucky with giving nearly 70% and reaching some goals. It’s time to be 1% better every day. The boring, disciplined habits, day in and day out, are what are going to lead to goals not only being met, but crushed!

As you can probably figure out from context clues, one of these goals is to get back to blogging. Blogging has always been something I loved, a way to express myself and get my thoughts, feelings, and heart out there. Whether it has to do with topics in education, family issues, running, or just life in general, blogging has always provided me comfort and has been a drug to clear my mind. Like I said earlier, it’s time to not only find myself again, but to sculpt the new and improved me. I appreciate your support and helping to keep me accountable on this journey.

I stopped setting resolutions years ago. I had adopted the “One Word” approach for a few years and then a mantra, where one would find a few words out of a word search-like picture, and those words became the ones to live the year by. You can read or listen to my previous words below.

2019 - BELIEVE

2020 - WATER

2021 - PRISM

2023 - MANTRA (blog)

2023 - MANTRA (podcast)

This year the four words that I found first were, STRENGTH, MONEY, ALIGNMENT, MIRACLES. I was pretty pleased with these words and felt that they suited myself, and my goals, perfectly. So what I’ve decided to do is create four separate blogs, each blog focusing on one of these words. This will be me diving back into the world of blogging, something that I can already feel a weight being lifted off of my shoulders and a fog clearing in my mind as I write this one!

To wrap this one up, our intro, I mentioned before that while this looks and sounds like so many others who dive into the New Year with a candle burning bright, only to have it fizzle out a few weeks later, this isn’t a New Year thing. It just happens to be that time of year. Instead, this is a “it’s been long overdue to make a change to reach your full potential” thing. Hence why we’re starting today, Monday, December 30, 2024.

***

Pick up my book, The Educulture Cookbook: Recipes & Dishes to Positively Transform Classroom & School Culture with EduMatch Publishing.