TIL my habit tracker was making me feel worse, not better

I had a row of 20 things I was tracking every day for about 6 months. Sleep, water, mood, exercise, reading, you name it. Last week I missed 4 days in a row and when I went to fill them in I got this knot in my stomach. Realized I was using the tracker to beat myself up over things I didn't do instead of just noticing patterns. So I scratched the whole thing and now I only track 3 things: did I go outside, did I eat vegetables, and did I talk to someone I care about. Feels way lighter. Has anyone else had a tracker backfire on them like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

kai_bennett19d ago

My buddy Sam had a food diary app that was supposed to help her eat better but she ended up just lying to herself about what she ate because she felt so guilty about the snacks. She'd log a small bag of chips as a "salad" just so the app wouldn't yell at her. Eventually she deleted the whole thing and now just takes a picture of her plate once a day, zero judgment. It's wild how something meant to help can turn into this weird secret punishment system.

tylerr3919d ago

Dropping from 20 to 3 is the smartest thing you could do. That daily checklist life just turns into a guilt trip instead of helping you see what's actually going on.