Take a moment to think about your relationship with your phone. If you’re like 73% of American adults, you might feel that your phone has a negative effect on your mental health. 

And while 76% of us believe we spend too much time on our phones, 74% of us have tried and failed to reduce our screen time.

This is very clearly a big problem. People are losing their ability to sleep, focus, and be present in the moment because of their phones. 

For those of us with ADHD, excessive screen time can make our symptoms worse. Problems like inattention, hyperactivity, emotional regulation, and comorbidities like anxiety and depression can get worse. 

In my last post, I introduced the concept of a growth mindset and a fixed mindset. We covered why a growth mindset is vital for improving your health, habits, and happiness. Now, we’re going to work on changing a fixed mindset.

Have you ever decided to change a habit or set a goal for yourself, only to have it fall through after a few days?

Yeah. We’ve all been there. Looking back at that goal you set for yourself, where did you go wrong?

Did you forget? Was it too hard? Did you find excuses for why you couldn’t do it?

Regardless of your reason, I have a solution for you: SMART goals.

SMART is an acronym for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. It’s a research-backed method for setting and achieving goals. Keep reading to learn how to go about your SMART goal setting, and to grab a free SMART Goal template.

Setting and achieving goals is HARD. It’s February, and you might find your new year’s resolution slipping through your fingers. In fact, Forbes reported that in 2020, over half of resolutioners threw in the towel after less than a year. If your goal is teetering on the edge, I have a proposition for you:

What if you re-work that personal goal and make it stick this time?

Imagine you’re sitting at your desk trying to get work done, and you just can’t get yourself to start your tasks. You feel like your to-do list is endless, and you have no motivation. You feel frustrated at yourself because you can’t focus.

You might think you need to focus in order to get started. But, what you really need is direction.

“I have no good ideas right now.”

Oh, have I been there.

Creative work is hard. You can’t always rely on creative ideas forming by themselves. Sometimes, it takes deliberate work. Fortunately, there are a few things you can do to help yourself get unstuck when you have no creative ideas.

While preparing to make a change to your life - exercising more, eating better, stressing less - you decide to pick a specific day to get started. You say:

“I’ll get started next week.”

Here’s the problem with that:

It lowers your odds of success.

There’s an app for everything. It’s no surprise that habit trackers are one of them. I tested a handful of habit-tracking apps and narrowed them down to ones that I believe are valuable.