My Mother always told me that if I can study for 1.5 hours every day, then I would be a top ace in school. I wouldn’t have to work extra hard near the exams.
I wish I had listened to her then.
Imagine doing something, everyday, for 90 minutes max. Where will you be six months later? A year later?
Done over a long period of time, that 1.5 hours daily adds up.
For example:
- You can memorize about 6 siparas of the Quran in one year if you were to give 1.5 hours per day to it.
- You can be at your peak physical form (six pack abs included!) within 6 months, if you give 1.5 hours to exercising your body.
- You can write more than three books of 100,000 words each in one year, if you can write every day for 1.5 hours.
- Jack LaLanne, considered the Father of Fitness, had a 90 minute workout routine that he did for almost sixty years. Yes, sixty years! Apart from a long list of other records, he did 1033 push ups in less than 23 minutes. He was 42 years old at the time.
What can you do with 1.5 hours per day?
Confusing goals with rituals
I ran my triathlon last year. I was physically very fit because of the training, Alhumdulillah. Three months later, I was a whopping 10 kgs overweight. 10 kgs!
I treated triathlon as a goal. I hacked it. I did the least required bits and got the job done.
But I didn’t set it up as a ritual.
I heard Chris Brogan say it first: if something’s good enough to do, it’s good enough to do every day.
I wish I knew back then what I know now: some goals should be used to set up habits and rituals.
Because what you do daily defines you more than what you have achieved in the past.
Can’t we give 60 to 90 minutes to our future selves? Imagine what we could achieve, imagine the better persons we’d become! God willing.
So my simple question to you is: what can you become in 3, 6, 12 months from now, if you can juuusssttt give it an hour or so everyday?
