21 days

Posted by Cortland On 9:08 PM
I have heard it said that it takes 21 days to make a habit. Which is an encouraging thing for most people because 21 is a not a super intimidating number. It's not easy to do all the time, believe me, I've had plenty of failed habit making attempts. It is a short enough amount of time however that allows a good deal of people to complete this habit forming process.

I've begun to take on some new habits and I'm going at them with a vengeance. For some of them I am a week in. For others I am mere days. But guarantee I will see them through to habit forming status.

As I thought about this today it made me wonder, If it takes 21 days to make a habit; how many days does it take to make a reputation? Come to find out it takes quite a bit longer. I thought about how intimidating this proposition was. To make a reputation it could take upwards of a year, maybe years in some cases.

At first this all came as a very overwhelming realization. The memories raced through my head of past failures and past habits that haunt my reputation to this very day.

As I thought longer however I remembered something my friend Mike (a common source for my illustrations) had told me about. He once told me of a company he had worked for selling pools. The thing about this job was that when you would sell a pool it could take up to 4 months to get your commission. To be successful at the pool selling profession you had to put in a lot of work up front that would not pay off till later.

It seems as if my situation is not all too different. I realize that I want to be seen as a certain kind of man. But in order to build this reputation I must be willing to put in a lot of effort up front. To me it will all be worth it.

LIVE
LOVE
YHWH
~cortland

2 Response to '21 days'

  1. Anonymous Said,
    http://cortlandthomas.blogspot.com/2008/08/21-days.html?showComment=1218659040000#c3889439749110255463'> August 13, 2008 at 1:24 PM

    you can do anything you put your mind to!
    yay for no lung cancer

     

  2. Anonymous Said,
    http://cortlandthomas.blogspot.com/2008/08/21-days.html?showComment=1219041660000#c4630720816190230'> August 17, 2008 at 11:41 PM

    Yeah! you can do it, keep up the running and breathing :)