For the longest time, I’ve been driven by closing my rings. The Apple Watch fitness tracking has actually been very good for me. I love the data, I love feeling like I accomplished something. If I’m coming up short that day, I want to make sure I put in a little bit of extra effort.
But there were things I deeply didn’t like about the system.
- It can be unhealthy for lots of people, maybe unhealthy for me too. The system can overly incentivize you and put undue pressure on you.
- I didn’t like the distraction of the Apple Watch. I was always getting buzzed, interrupting conversations with people. They noticed, and it broke my concentration. That’s just kind of crummy, and I didn’t like that.
- it’s pedestrian, bland, boring to me
So here’s my new strategy: see how quickly I can take my Apple Watch off each day.
Here’s how it works. I put it on in the morning, do my exercises, and as soon as I’m able to hit my goals for exercise, I take the watch off. It satisfies that goal-driven side of me, and my new goal is how quickly can I get the watch off, because really I don’t want to wear the watch.
There’s a slight caveat. I have been keeping it on until about 5:15 PM during work hours because I find it helpful to have access to things like timers and alerts during the day. But I might get to the point where I stop doing that too.
The challenge appeals to me because it flips the incentive. Instead of trying to maximize my interaction with the device, I’m trying to minimize it while still getting the benefits I actually want from it.