What am I practicing today? I can read, listen to, or blog about anything I want, but what’s far more important is what I actually practice.

That’s not to discount the benefit of listening to and reading quality materials. I believe in ingesting quality inputs, as fuel, motivation, and to prime your thinking process. The reality is though that it’s easy to be an over consumer. One who hears about ten concepts a day but retains, deeply understands and implements 0 of them.

How do we avoid this? Intention, specific commitments, and focus are one solution.

Set (write, share, make real) your intentions.

Make specific, clear commitments.

Focus to avoid distractions and ensure you follow through.

Abstract theories pale in comparison to tangible examples, so I’ll share one here in my life. I set an intention to start writing again last year, and shared with my wife and family that I was going to start blogging. I committed to journaling and blogging daily. I focused on making that the first thing I did in the morning. I even have a mantra “consume before I create” that’s helped me keep perspective and remember to focus on my writing (though I still read).

As a real life example of how we can get distracted, I had a baby during that time and stopped writing for months – but now I’ve restarted since a few months ago, which is the most important part – starting again, not quitting forever.

What are you practicing today? Who are you becoming?