Did you know? Accomplishing small tasks can have a positive impact on your dopamine?
The satisfaction from the accomplishment makes you feel good and can motivate you to do more of the behavior for more satisfaction. Dopamine impacts our sense of pleasure and can help improve focus, motivation, mood, and attention, among other things.
Consider how you can apply this to your life. If you want to start a new habit such as exercise or tackle a big project such as organizing your house, sometimes setting one big goal can feel overwhelming, which makes it harder for us to even start.
Instead, try giving yourself something small to accomplish each day. Rather than setting a goal to organize your kitchen, make a series of smaller goals with the intention to do one task per day or per week.
Your intentional daily or weekly actions might be to organize one single cabinet or drawer each day. Another way to approach this would be to spend five minutes organizing a different section of your kitchen each day. With this approach, you’d set a timer for five minutes and when it goes off, you get to decide if you want to continue and have time to continue, or if you are done for the day.
This approach helps you feel less overwhelmed about getting started. It’s easier to commit to these smaller tasks (because you can do anything for five minutes nearly every day!), and you quickly start to see progress from the daily actions.
How have I used this in my own life?
One way I’ve applied this to my life was that I committed to do five minutes of intentional physical activity every day. This is attainable because I always have time for at least a five-minute walk, and most days I end up doing much more than five minutes. This has helped me make physical activity a lifestyle and see myself as an active person. Each day, I feel accomplished because I did what I committed to do. It also helps me combat the nagging feeling of guilt for not doing anything at all. I have been able to consistently keep up with this goal for 9 months now.
How can you apply this idea to your life? Which big projects or new habits can you break into smaller daily tasks? Or what intentional activities can you do for five minutes per day?
Thanks for reading, and as always, I’m cheering you on with GRACE!
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