2020 Keystone Habits + Why I'm Doing Resolutions Differently This Year

Every new year starts as a fresh beginning, but the fact that this one launches a whole new decade makes it feel particularly important.

When talking about our 2020 goals and resolutions, Doug shared an interesting story with me all about forming a keystone habit.

There’s a famous story about a man named Paul O’Neill, who joined the aluminum manufacturing giant Alcoa as CEO in the late 80s. After a series of failed product launches, investors were eager for the new leader to bring innovative, grand changes. But instead of diving into the investor-pleasing topics of profit margins or revenue projections in his first big press conference, O’Neill noted that the company would focus on one thing to create growth: Worker safety.

(Hear me out; there’s a point to sharing this. I’ll make this part short and easy to digest!)

Basically, despite lots of criticism and people saying he would fail, O’Neill was able to quintuple Alcoa’s income while making it one of the safest companies in the world. All by focusing on that one “Keystone habit”, labeled as such by Charles Duhigg, author of “The Power of Habit”.

It’s a great example of how obsessing over something important can lead to big results. As this Forbes article notes, that obsession doesn’t have to be safety: “A company can get comparable results from focusing on customers, innovation, operational excellence, employee engagement or some other goal integral to the company’s success.” The point is that focusing on doing one thing really, really great has a trickle-down effect that improves countless other areas, leading to overarching success.

Alright, back to present day.

2020 Keystone Habits + Why I’m Doing Resolutions Differently This Year

Resolutions are a hot topic right now, no?

I have mixed thoughts on them. In fact, I’ve been all over the map when it comes to them. Want proof? It’s all in the archives, baby.

2017 – Shared advice on “How To Make Resolutions That Stick.” In hindsight, I cringe at these photos but actually love the tactical advice shared here, if you’re one to make resolutions.
2018 – Pivoted from loving resolutions to rebelling against them in “Not Another Resolution Post”.
2019 – Landed somewhere in the middle. “Bloom Where You Are Planted,” I proclaimed, and approached the year with somewhat loose intentions and a few specific goals.

It’s funny, because in hindsight I see that my approaches for the years were actually an interesting psychological reflection on where I was in life. 2017 I was in the prime of being our family’s breadwinner, pregnant with Josephine, and needing lots of structure/stability. 2018 I was craving more flexibility from the corporate structure I’d been in for years, and behind the scenes we were prepping for our big cross-state move, Last year, 2019, I had recently quit my full time job, was setting sail in my first year of entrepreneurship, and had no idea where the journey would take me.

Surprise, surprise! This year I’ve got a new approach again, and that’s to focus on a keystone habit.

Gotta keep it interesting, right?! 😉

Here’s the thing about my past approaches: I’ve personally found that being strict with resolutions doesn’t allow for the flexibility that life entails, while being too vague (i.e. Choosing a phrase of the year in lieu of setting actual goals) doesn’t provide enough accountability.

Doug and I were talking about our resolution problems of the past, and about how we’ve tended to have a habit of either making them too big, so that they were nearly impossible to have sticking power, or too loose, to where no change is really harbored. Instead, we talked about focusing on small, habit-forming changes. The intent of these are to create actionable, realistic, manageable habits that we actually adhere to. Best, they all ideally ladder up to a bigger goal or result, so in effect it does enable big changes, through small actions.

It’s like that CEO example I talked about above. Focusing on one thing — one area of excellence — had a trickle down effect that created an effect much bigger. Sure, it’s a business example, but it can absolutely be applied to personal growth, too.

With all that in mind, I’m approaching my 2020 “resolutions” by defining a keystone habit to work on, with a few small, habit-forming changes that will help me to get there.

Quick refresh: Keystone Habits were first introduced in “The Power of Habit” and are, “Small changes or habits that people introduce into their routines that unintentionally carry over into other aspects of their lives.”

I’ve divided my “Keystone Habits” by life sections, because I have different excellence goals depending on the area we’re talking about. Here they are!

Personal

Keystone Habit: Clear personal clutter

Small, everyday tactics to help me get there:

Read all the books that I own but haven’t read yet.
At the end of every day, ensure there are no “piles” in bedroom. Everything gets put away in its place.
Unsubscribe or unfollow all news outlets, social accounts, or email communications the moment that they don’t spark joy.

Family

Keystone Habit: Quality Time Spent *Doug and I made our family section together!

Small, everyday tactics to help us get there:

TV cut off for the girls at 7pm every night
Each parent has a one-on-one date with each kid every quarter
Once a month, Doug and Em go on a date night with just the two of us
Screen cut off for Doug and Em by 10pm (Includes phones and computers)

Business

Keystone Habit: Consistency

Small, everyday tactics to help me get there:

By the end of January, be two weeks ahead of editorial calendar. Keep this cadence throughout year.
At the end of every week, respond to or file all email communications
Every Monday, dedicate the full morning to completing administration functions. (Invoicing, calendar management, etc.)

Some of these many seem minor, but my approach right now is to have very manageable tactics in play that will help to ladder up to consistent, bigger changes. The goal is to make these changes so ingrained in life that they become second nature! Time will tell if this approach works, but I will say that as of now I have a very good feeling about it.