Day 1 - Laying the Foundation

I was recently introduced to a lovely site called Zen Habits which aims to increase productivity, motivation, simplifying, budgeting and an overall sense of happiness. It's one of those incredible sites that after you browse it for about a half hour you are convinced you are going to do every single one of your New Year's resolutions that you've made for the past 6 years all tomorrow. Unfortunately, tomorrow then comes and you have to go to work. And do laundry. And watch Lost. And do everything else that has nothing to do with increasing productivity and long term happiness.

So my question to myself late last night was this: Can normal people implement this kind of structure into their lives? And further, can normal young people do it?

I emphasize the last part because from what I can tell, these personal improvement techniques (read: The Franklin Covey system, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, GTD, etc.) seem to work for an older crowd (e.g. Boomers) and not necessarily for those of us who are relatively new to living on our own in the Real World. Can a 23 year old city living girl become Zen, too?

Now granted, I am slightly more primed for a challenge like this in that I'm already totally bought into systems like this. I cherished my Franklin Covey yellow day planner throughout my 4 years of college - even cried when I thought I lost it. I compulsively make lists for anything that clutters my mind. I insist on cleaning out my wardrobe twice a year. And I enjoy organizing my work inbox more than I'd like to admit.

But I can't seem to implement any real lasting structure. Which is why I am setting up this challenge to become Zen. Essentially the rules of the challenge are simple: I simply will become an avid reader of the Zen Habits blog and try to live according to his suggestions. This may sound relatively easy but in practice I think it will be very challenging. This guy lays out things like 50 Tips for Grocery Shopping. 50?? I'm lucky if I have ketchup in my fridge.

I will lay out my personal goals in my next post but wanted to get the ball rolling today before I go to work. I am currently trying to Become an Early Riser according to Zen. I got up 20 minutes earlier than usual and it has actually been quite nice. I ate breakfast and created a blog! Day 1 = a success!