Today’s post is a follow up on how things are going since I made some changes to my schedule on Day 69/100 to prioritize workouts first thing in the day. On Day 69 in 100LD, I shifted into the third act of this project with an intention to nurture my body and attune to its wisdom. My keystone habit stats reveal some positive progress.

100 Liminal Days is an experimental project of embracing my current transitional season after exiting my business by sharing an honest, real-time account of my self-initiation experience in daily posts. Visit Day 1/100 to learn more and sign up to get the weekly recaps delivered to your inbox.

For Days 1-69 of this project, I started each day with my Daily Pages journaling practice followed by my blog post for the day. I had workouts on my calendar each day in the afternoon, but it often got skipped. Sometimes it was because I was spending longer on journaling or writing the day’s post, other times, I just didn’t feel like it and couldn’t overcome that mental hurdle. I knew my workouts were getting missed more often than not, but I was struggling to make the necessary changes to get fitness back on track.

Since I track all of my habits in Notion and have the built in AI to help me analyze my data, I did a quick check-in on Day 69/100 which helped me to see in black and white where I needed the most improvement to reach my goals. Workouts were clearly my weakest link, so I prioritized exercise to bring myself into an even more stable daily routine.

Data on November 28th, Day 69/100

• Output and Cadence
  • 67 of 68 days captured Daily Pages, about 98.5% consistency.
  • 64 Dharma Sprints logged, ~94% of days.
  • Total words: 83,703. Average per day: 1,231. 
• Keystone Habits Completion
  • Meditate/Pray: 61 of 68 days, ~89.7%.
  • Qigong: 64 of 68 days, ~94.1%.
  • Workout: 33 of 68 days, ~48.5%.
• Streaks (longest within the first 68 days)
  • Daily Pages: 54 straight days.
  • Meditate/Pray: 42 days.
  • Qigong: 57 days.
  • Workout: 7 days.
  • Dharma Sprint: 32 days.

Changes to Data from November 28th to December 25th

With this data right in front of me, I decided to adjust my daily schedule and put the workouts at the top of the day. Instead of sitting down to journal and take it slower right out of bed, I started getting up and hitting the gym first thing, and I moved qigong to an earlier time slot, too.

I immediately noticed my energy levels elevate earlier in the day, which actually has helped me write my posts in less time! I have more consistently finished my keystone habits and the daily blog post by lunchtime since re-ordering my day. But let’s look at the new data to see what else has changed.

I asked the AI to analyze the data from Days 69-95 to see how things have changed since I shifted priorities.

• Output and Cadence
  • 24 of 27 days captured Daily Pages, 88.9% (−9.6 pts vs 98.5%).
  • 23 Dharma Sprints, 85.2% (−8.9 pts vs 94.1%).
  • Total words: 24,965 over 27 days
  • Average per day: 925 (−24.8% vs 1,231).
  • Range: 104 to 1,636 words (min −281, max −1,825 vs 385 to 3,461).
• Keystone Habits Completion
  • Meditate/Pray: 20 of 27, 74.1% (−15.6 pts vs 89.7%).
  • Qigong: 21 of 27, 77.8% (−16.3 pts vs 94.1%).
  • Workout: 22 of 27, 81.5% (+33.0 pts vs 48.5%).
• Streaks (within Days 69–95 vs longest in Days 1–68)
  • Daily Pages: 15 (−39 vs 54).
  • Meditate/Pray: 7 (−35 vs 42).
  • Qigong: 7 (−50 vs 57).
  • Workout: 15 (+8 vs 7).
  • Dharma Sprint: 15 (−17 vs 32).

Adherence Comparison

What does the new data suggest?

Recommitting to fitness has paid off: I hit workouts on 81.5% of days, with a new 15‑day streak. That progress came with trade‑offs. My meditation, qigong, daily pages, and dharma sprint rates dipped, and my average word count eased from ~1,250 to ~925. I think some of the dips in reflective practices are due to travel and holiday activities which have made it harder for me to sit down and write for longer periods necessary for thoughtful posts.

Even so, the experiment’s third act is doing what I hoped – re‑prioritizing my body, building strength, and bringing even more stability into my daily habits. The third act of 100 Liminal Days was meant to tune into more of my body’s wisdom, and I can see in the data and my energy levels that this change has really helped me optimize my daily routines. (Yay!)

However, I can see now that I need further tuning of the dials so this physical embodiment work and contemplative and spiritual reflection reinforce each other rather than compete.

Data Across All Days 1-95

When I look at the entire project, Days 1-95, I am proud of how this has gone. I think if I had made the shift into workouts sooner, that area would have higher adherence overall, too. But this experiment has helped me find the right order and time commitments necessary for consistency. I’ll keep this going even after finishing 100LD.

• Daily Pages: 91 of 95 days, 95.8%
• Meditate/Pray: 81 of 95 days, 85.3%
• Qigong: 85 of 95 days, 89.5%
• Workout: 55 of 95 days, 57.9%
• Dharma Sprint: 87 of 95 days, 91.6%
• Writing volume: average 1,157 words/day, total 109,947

What Habit Tracking Has Taught Me

It’s important to acknowledge that tracking my habits like this is not just a silly quirk of an overly Type A personality 🙂 and it’s also meant to be something I experiment with during this time-bound project, not necessarily keep up indefinitely. There is a good chance I’ll keep tracking these habits because I like monitoring progress over longer periods of time and analyzing to see how it correlates with other things going on in my life. That said, I know that even having just 100 days of data is enough to understand what works for me.

Having this level of data has helped me dial my habits in faster because I can see the truth intellectually versus just going on a gut feeling about how I’m doing. Seeing this data was insightful – I hadn’t realized how my reflective practices like qigong, meditation, prayer, and Daily Pages had given way to the new commitment to workout. This knowledge will help me tweak those habits back up a bit. I’d love to see all habits consistently hitting with 85% or higher adherence in the new year and beyond.

What I Am Trying Next

I think that spending more time outside of the holiday season keeping workouts first thing in the day followed by qigong and then moving into practices I do while sitting down feels like the right order to do this and capture another month or so of data. I’m curious to see how these practices will fuel more creation and output if I continue to start my day with that burst of adrenaline and then ease into mindfulness and more gentle movement before sitting and writing.

If You Want to Try This

If you are curious about how to harness your own energy waves and develop healthy practices that support your goals, try tracking your habits for a season. (I wrote this post about my Notion tracking system which I offer free to my newsletter subscribers.)

1. Try tracking (and not judging or beating yourself up if you are missing habits) for 30 days or more. This isn’t about changing anything yet, just gaining an awareness.
2. After 30 days, review the data and choose one of those habits to improve versus trying to fix everything all at once. Whichever one you want to improve, move it to the very first thing you do each day.
3. Now, track success in Yes’s and No’s versus number of minutes or hours doing something. Did you do the thing? Yes or No? Track it daily for another 30 days.
4. After the second month, review the data again.
   • Did you improve adherence to the habit?
   • Did any other habits fall back?
   • How do you feel since making the changes?

With even a small batch of data, you can better understand what makes you feel more energized, and start improving your habits. Remember not to be too rigid either – if something isn’t working out, change it up! Run another experiment. Experimenting and analyzing will help you find what works specifically for your life, your schedule, your energy.

This final act of 100LD is reminding me that clarity is something we can embody. I’m keeping the workouts first, bringing qigong earlier, and continuing to protect a small, steady writing block. My goal isn’t to do everything perfectly – it’s to keep becoming someone who keeps showing up – in body, mind, and spirit. On to the next!

Weekly recaps of 100 Liminal Days are emailed on Tuesdays only to my newsletter subscribers. If you want the summaries, share your email here to get on the list. You’ll also instantly receive a free Notion template I use every single day to track my habits and reflect on the day.