Day 393 & Why Do Depletion Days Happen

Day 393 Record Keeping
Day 362 Fixed Meditation
Day 308 Bodyweight Exercise (2 pushups)
Day 235 Writing (58 words)
Day 408 Eating
Day 43 Dynamic Meditation = 71 (1 hour)
Great sleep, slow wakeup. Sick. Really depleted. 
Possible factors: Sick, cheat day yesterday. Went biking for the first time yesterday. Slept well last night. Had beer last night. The days before had a lot of travel - errands that kept me busy. The end of last night I felt utterly drained - I fought on to do more things work-related beyond what I needed to do. Perhaps cutting off writing …or any habit….is just as important as starting it.

Dynamic Med Notes (1 hour):
x10 fidgeting
I’ve started catching fidgeting - the urge before
x4 shoulders
x4 arising caught
x1 an arising
X1 laughter

Why Do Ego-Depletion Days Happen?

There are some random days, like today, I feel utterly depleted and have to go down to basic executions of habits. Why?

Of course today I’m sick, but I’m really curious as to why in other circumstances. I think this is a really important factor - does a high output day that causes a higher willpower expenditure cause an ego depletion state the next day? Is this something that takes time? Is that ego depleted state a delayed reaction to high will expenditure? Because it certainly feels like it some days.

Some days it’s not a case of doing something difficult, and then later feeling depleted - there are days I just start out feeling utterly exhausted.

Baumeister has a daily correspondence - you do something that expends willpower, the next task is going to suffer, and regeneration occurs after ingesting glucose or sleeping. Could this be how endurance depletion works? It would explain waking up depleted - that weeks of higher endurance loads culminate in a day that starts off with depleted willpower. It also makes sense of treating endurance as a separate (but related) factor with it’s own dynamic.

It’s something I really want to pay attention to. When I’m experiencing these days I need to note any other abnormal circumstances.

Also, is there a corresponding high willpower day with great output earlier in the week? I might have in this case - I’ve been having really good writing days and meditations….again, something to keep an eye on.

Day 161 & Inexplicable Anxiety & Perfect Score

Day 161 Record Keeping SRHI = 84
Day 129 Fixed Meditation SRHI = 82
Day 75 Bodyweight Exercise SRHI= 79 (2x8, 1x4 burpees)
Day 2 Writing = 12
Day 175 Eating SRHI = 62
Good sleep, good wakeup. Severe bought of anxiety yesterday. FIRST PERFECT SCORE ON THE SRHI!!!

Inexplicable Anxiety Yesterday
Yesterday was perhaps the most efficient completion of my habits I’ve ever had. I woke up early, went from task to task without any dithering and finished my work before lunch.

Then my mind started racing, thinking about tasks I wasn’t at yet. Writing, future assignments, tasks I have yet to get done, photography, wishing this whole process would hurry up. Basically goal-oriented thinking, instead of the process oriented manner that this entire project is based on.

But stepping back, all this negative emotion is right on queue - I’ve started a new habit, adding to my endurance load. And this is a habit I’m quite fearful of. What is needed is forgiveness -I’m going to mess up, and I’m going to be assailed - it’s just the hallmark of endurance depletion.

What I ended up doing is taking a moment to relax. I went to the beach, I did some meditation, and the feeling faded and I had a great rest of the day. Next time this happens I’m going to watch some funny youtube videos - a task that worked really well when I was experimenting with regimentation. I wanted something that acted to counter ego depletion - Baumeister found that sugar did the job. I wanted an alternative, and youtube seemed to work.

Perfect Score
I think the only reason I got this was because I was so loopy from doing my burpees. I couldn’t think straight, and basically found myself slogging through my daily SRHI - it was completely automatic. I’m beginning to think that self awareness is important - not only as one factor for the SRHI score, but it somehow enhances all other factors. It becomes shifted and seated as more a part of who I am. Knowing that I do the task without thinking in my mind makes it more a part of me, which shores up identity questions.