The 1% in July

What did the 1% look like last month? And what am I focusing on in August?

Spring in the Canadian Rockies - 2018. Possibly my favourite time of year in my favourite place in the world.

Hello mates, I hope you’re doing well.

It’s been a very full-on few weeks (lots of client work, lots of doc appointments, lots of managing energy as best I can) hence being a couple of days late for this month’s 1% post.

I know this is the best little corner of the internet, with the kindest, most accepting community, and I know you’re all here because you value the idea of slowness, but I still want to thank you for understanding. I can’t tell you how much it means to know everyone here gets it. When it feels like the world does nothing but race and expect us to keep up no matter the cost, to have a place where we’re allowed to opt out — no matter how briefly — is so affirming.

And with that, on to my 1% experiment for July!

(Just a quick heads up that these posts are usually for paying subscribers only, but because we’re halfway through the year, I thought I’d open this one up to everyone. If you like it and would like to support The Tortoise as a paying subscriber, you can sign up below and know that your support keeps the lights of this operation on. Literally! It also means you can join my upcoming online retreat — Writing as Self-Care — which will be launching next month, and get access to extra posts throughout the month.)

If you’ve found yourself here with no idea what I’m talking about, here’s a brief recap:

The 1% is my guiding principle of 2023, an effort to make slow and steady change over time rather than taking big, unsustainable leaps occasionally.

Sometimes practising the 1% looks like spending 15 minutes of my day on something (1% of a day being literally 15 minutes), other times it’s more about making tiny incremental shifts to what I’m doing, either in the hope of creating significant change over time, or to recognise that a 1% improvement is still an improvement.

I’m trying to apply the idea of the 1% every day and am reporting back each month (you can see previous posts here, here, here and here), and would love you to join in with me, if you’re keen.

How did I apply the 1% in July?

We’re now solidly into the second half of the year, and I can feel things shifting as we move slowly towards spring. The blossoms and daffodils and longer days and birds making nests all remind me of the ebb and flow of things — the seasons we live — whether we pay attention to them or not.

As I’ve mentioned a couple of times lately, my health has been all over the place and I’ve really had to focus on managing my energy — both the input and the output.

In last month’s post, I said the focus of July would be applying the 1% to some things around the house, as well as:

• Continuing my boring but important self-care (sleep, nutrition, water, movement)

• Reducing guilt

• Resting as needed

• Writing (or thinking about writing)

To start with, the guilt thing was really interesting. Many of you were super kind in the comments of last month’s post, suggesting that instead of allowing myself to feel guilty for 15 minutes a day and putting it aside for the rest of the day as I suggested I do, I might need to reduce my expectations instead.

I want to thank you, because of course, you were right. In fact, I think ‘reduce expectations’ was the unintended but very welcome motto of July.

My fatigue was pretty rough for the first half of the month, so this motto helped me to do something, without feeling pressure to do everything, particularly when it came to things on my to-do list. Did I declutter the wardrobes? Yes. Have I dealt with the decluttered clothes? Kind of. Some went to cousins, some went to friends, some to the school. But there are still two boxes I need to send off to Upparel, multiple bags for the op shop and a small pile of things I want to sell, all sitting on the spare bed behind me right now.

(I said I’d declutter the wardrobes, I never said anything about dealing with those items straight away.) See? Reducing expectations.

I also took the pressure off myself completely when it came to writing, and spent a lot of time just thinking about my novel. I worked out some more big tricky story knots and mind-mapped a bit and am sure that over the coming months I’ll put all of that thinking into words on the page.

In terms of the self-care and rest, I didn’t so much reduce my expectations as stick with the boring things that help me feel well. Drinking enough water, taking my supplements, going for a quick swim in the cold ocean, stretching while waiting for the coffee to brew in the morning — they mostly seem inconsequential but they’re the foundation on which I build pretty much everything else. I also took the benefit of the kids being on holiday and ran with it, giving myself permission to have an afternoon siesta whenever I needed it.

So, what did I learn (or relearn) this month?

Even though this year-long experiment is about the 1%, I think it’s in my nature (and probably the nature of many of us) to continually shift the goal posts. So the past month was all about accepting that 1% is powerful, but it is still 1%. And that’s okay. In fact, that’s where its power lies — it’s just going to take longer to see the benefits.

I learnt:

• To reduce my expectations and embrace the power of doing something, not everything.

• Rest is not time wasted.

• Thinking can sometimes be just as important as doing, and should definitely be counted as such.

• When feeling frustrated by all of the above, go back to the basics of 1%. 15 minutes, or a 1% effort to improve something is enough. As James Clear wrote, when things get overwhelming, we can “reduce the scope, stick to the schedule”.

What will I focus on in August?

I think there’s something really important for me to learn in this idea of reducing expectations of myself. It clashes horribly with my impatient nature and makes me feel very uncomfortable, which is why I know I need to pay attention to it.

So this month, I’m going to try and actively let things be just okay. (Even writing that makes me cringe a bit, thinking of all the ways it might mean I’m not enough, but again, I think that signifies something worth exploring… That, or I need to find a therapist? Or both?)

I’m not sure how to quantify any of that into a percentage, but if I can make small efforts to reduce my expectations every day, I think that would be a good place to begin. Practically speaking, I guess that means working to shift the needle a little on things like:

• self-criticism — dialling that critical inner-voice down a notch or two

• feeling like I need to ‘earn’ things like rest or relaxation

• over-estimating what I can realistically get done in a given timeframe

It will definitely be an interesting month! And I’d love to hear from you. Are you exploring the 1% this year? How is it progressing? Have you found a thread weaving its way through your lessons? Let us know in the comments.

I’ll be back Thursday with a post about redemption stories, but until then, take good care.
Brooke xx