Tracking Tips

“What you measure, you can manage,” Chris Newton.

Hello Thorny Roses, and Welcome!

I don’t know about you, but I do like data! I find it really useful for knowing what’s going on. I wear an Apple Watch, an old version, but it tracks my activity, and lets me compare, for instance, this year’s activity to last year’s. Sometimes it leads to real a-ha moments (I feel less fit because I am moving less, for example). I can also track my heart rate, both resting and during exercise, walking steadiness, Cardio- Vascular fitness, how often I stand up, how long I’m sitting for, that sort of thing. I could monitor sleep and breathing patterns, too, if I wore it at night.

I also have a “Streaks” app that I find very helpful. You can choose what you want to keep track of, how many times a day you want to do it, how many days a week, and that sort of thing. I’ve even found it helpful to remind me to take various vitamins, and you can set it up to send reminders. It is a paid app, but therefore there are no ads and it’s a one-off payment. I am sure there are others if you search for them.

Or you might not like tech, and prefer a chart that you print out, or a simple spreadsheet that you update. Or a diary that you make entries into. Or even just a word document that you record your activity in. Either way, I really recommend that you do something that keeps a track of what you are doing on a daily basis. It’s hard to keep a sense of how much you have been doing otherwise. You might have a week that’s a bit on and off, and in your mind you’ve done nothing for months. Or the opposite!

If you are motivated this way, you might like to allocate points for each activity and set yourself a daily target. Or set yourself up with an accountability buddy. Or post every day to the You Tube video. I’m not a very competitive person myself, so I’m not a fan of leader boards and so on, but if you are and you want to get together with a competitive friend, go for it!

We are also going to look at Gretchen Rubin’s Four Tendencies Framework, which I think you will find useful and fun, but essentially, going it alone is hard! Having support and encouragement from other people, or even from some tech, can make all the difference.

Attached is an example of the sort of tracking sheet that might work. Place a tick in the relevant box every time you do a “unit” of the activity. Decide what a unit would mean to you. Ten minutes of walking? 20 reps of the exercise? Maybe doing the exercise ladder counts as 4 units?

I’ve included a “taken rest” box, as well - this is for when you feel like you want to push yourself, to be able to tick the boxes, but you know in your heart you are not well enough/sound enough to exercise and that rest is the best option for you. Since women find this hard to do usually, I have included that option for you to tick when you really listen to what your body needs!

Let me know if you use other methods to track your activity. Please feel free to share any resources that you have found useful.

Well done, thanks for being here. You being part of this community is what makes it so valuable. We need to have each other’s backs and I am glad you are here.