What do you swear by?

Brand, thing, behavior, method, advice, mantra, etc.

I swear by Blackwing pencils.

Also, the ‘two minute rule’, which has really improved my life: “if it takes two minutes or less to do, just do it now; if it takes longer, schedule it.” I’ve got untreated attention issues and it’s very easy for me to notice something needing done, and overlook or procrastinate it because it seems inconvenient in the moment. Having a totally painless rule that forces me to acknowledge that thing I should pick up, that trash bag I should change, etc, or, to at least put on my calendar anything I mustn’t forget in the long run has been great for me.

kite,

Oil of Olay has an in-shower body lotion/body conditioner that works better than any regular lotion I have ever used. And I’ve tried them all. You shower normally, rinse, and what I do is turn off the shower and just use my hands to swipe water off myself so I can get better coverage with the lotion. Then I start from my head and work my way down with the lotion. (Doing it this way saves on product too). When I’m done, turn the water back on and rinse off. The stuff is magical. I have to be careful of things I put on my skin due to some sensitivity issues, and I have zero problems with this. It’s stupid expensive and nearly impossible to find in stores anymore so I have to get it online, but it’s worth it. After a week of not using it, my skin is a flakey, itchy mess.

They have a version with lavendar and retinol in it now as well, but I haven’t tried that one. I just use the regular one.

LUHG_HANI,
@LUHG_HANI@lemmy.world avatar

I thought this was going down the Patrick Bateman route in the middle.

MonkderZweite,

Scheisse!

Timecircleline,

If you wouldn’t take advice from someone, then don’t accept their criticism.

Wirlocke,

On a light note, I’m a slut for Bethesda, atleast I skipped Fallout 76 but I’m gonna preorder Starfield. I was 11 when Skyrim came out and it’s very near and dear to me and I love some aspects of Fallout 4. ESO was also not bad and I play Elder Scrolls Legends. I’m seeing this through to the end bois ✌️.

On a serious note, I swear by never drinking alone or without someone I trust as much as my partner. Nothing bad happened to me but I have several negative experiences with drinking in my family. And technically my dad died riding a motorcycle drunk, but I don’t think being sober would have saved him from that specific incident.

I just never ever want to be anything close to an alcoholic. I feel like I would get addicted if it was more convenient and didn’t taste bad. Fear of addiction is also why I’m wary of gambling.

jmer,

Is Legends still worth playing? I stopped after they announced there were going to be no new updates. Seems like with no new cards being added it’s only a matter of time before the most consistent/best/unbeatable deck comes is devised.

Wirlocke,

I’ve been enjoying it, there’s still consistent players and a good variety of decks I’ve fought.

Though you will learn to groan when you see an Oblivion Gate, Midnight Burial, or Paarthurnax.

My personal gripe is that there are so many ways to destroy/silence creatures and not many full proof counters. I’ll have several turns of placing something down, it gets destroyed, repeat.

But I always play ranked and at the moment have an equipment based deck, and a deck built around creatures that deal damage. Hardly meta but with each I win about half the time and slowly climb the ranks.

jmer,

Appreciate the feedback. Maybe I’ll pick it up again. I managed to grind my way to Legend rank before giving up.

zorrothefox2001,
@zorrothefox2001@lemmy.world avatar

Chain wallet. Might be uncool depending on your fit but you’ll never lose it. I was skeptical until I got one.

ErwinLottemann,

Yeah

zorrothefox2001,
@zorrothefox2001@lemmy.world avatar

Lol this is definitely before my time, is this a goof or was it ever that deep to people?

ErwinLottemann,

No, it was a prody band, but the music was good! 🤣

Etterra,

Never piss off the people who make your food, cut your hair, or work on your teeth.

Duamerthrax,

Adding to this, consider a second opinion on any dental work. One quoted me for a big job, but because of circumstances, I ended up going to a different dentist and they didn’t see anything wrong with my mouth. Been a number of years since and there’s been no problems without any work being done.

littlecolt,

Zipper cases. These are thin pillowcases that close with a zipper. You then put the normal pillowcase over the zippercase.

Why? Because it extends the life of your pillow. A normal pillowcase can slide while sleeping, etc… which can cause your face, hair, head, body, and all the oil it produces to get on the pillow itself. With the zippercase, you have a second line of defense to keep the pillow fresh.

Sure, you can clean the pillow, or run it through a gentle cycle in the wash, but it is way better to just avoid that. Let the double layer of protection do most of the work and absorb that body oil.

Change case 1 or 2 times weekly, change/wash zippercase weekly. Your pillow will stay fresh and clean and much more pleasant for longer, for a minimal amount of added work of putting that second case on.

Anyway I hope you are sold.

Multech,

Sounds smart. Might look into this, thanks!

kite,

And to add on to this - curly-haired people, put a silky case on your pillow. It will not snag your hair nearly as badly as a non-silky one does, which means less frizz when you get up in the morning.

EssentialCoffee,

Zipper cases. These are thin pillowcases that close with a zipper.

For people googling, I’ve always seen them sold as pillow protectors.

teawrecks,

The problem with the 2 minute rule is when it recurses.

RGB3x3,

Or when you have like 59 things that take under two minutes, so you have to spend hours doing them anyway. So you just don’t do them because you don’t want to have to spend hours on chores on your one day off.

metiulekm,

Isn’t this the point though? Like, if you spot that (let’s concretize) the trash is starting to overflow, you can either take it out right now which will take you 2 minutes and (hopefully) barely interrupt your day, or you can add it to your list of things to do. And so you get that list of 59 things by ignoring the 2-minute rule, not by applying it.

DozensOfDonner,

My god this is recognizable

OrkneyKomodo,
@OrkneyKomodo@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

For a moment I was wondering whether the “two minute rule” was a lower hygiene standard for the acceptable time in which you can eat things after dropping them on the floor.

The only thing I’ve found in life that I find super helpful or swear by is using dated lists to organise what needs doing in my life.

Dragon_Titan,

2 minute rule. Is anything that you can do in 2 minute. Do it.

Its meant for you to complete tasks you may otherwise have no interest in doing or low in your priorities.

Primer81,

The dated lists I find helpful as well - I’ve been doing this daily for the past few months just to keep track of work tasks and personal tasks that I really shouldn’t forget about.

pastermil,

Laptop: post-classic Thinkpads, especially the series 30

Multitool: Leatherman

Soap: Dr. Bronner

jelloeater85,
@jelloeater85@lemmy.world avatar

ThinkPads are OG AF

atimholt,

Grabthar’s hammer.

Reverendender,

What a savings

ada,
@ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

It’s moments like these that I find myself wishing I had some kind of rudimentary lathe

LiarBesidalAll,

Is there air?? You don’t know!

HR_Pufnstuf,

The water cooler. You?

drmoose,

I have a water cooler at home that does hot and cold water too. Best home purchase ever.

HR_Pufnstuf,

No no, you misunderstand me. I prefer to stand by the water cooler and swear. :)

Azzu,

Why are there so many writing utensil suggestions in this thread? I haven’t written anything down physically in years, I don’t even know why you’d need a pencil or paper anymore.

Reverendender,

Also, writing things down physically has become almost painful for me. I do have atrocious handwriting, which probably contributes to this feeling.

Twelve20two,

Have you tried fountain pens?

Shard,

Yes. I too like to ruin not one but four pages at a time with my terrible handwriting

Twelve20two,

What do you mean?

Shard,

I have terrible handwriting. In top of that problem, I sometimes use too much pressure. And I tend to leave the pen on the paper while I think of what I’m going to write. With a fountain pen, too much pressure means more ink released, which leaves ugly blotches that readily soaks through a few pages.

So not only is the first page ruined by my initially ugly handwriting, the succeeding pages are further ruined with the blotches of ink that soaked through.

Twelve20two,

Ah, thank you for clarifying. If it helps at all, fountain pens can write with minimal pressure (although getting out of the habit of using a lot of pressure is hard to break [I personally blame shitty ballpoint pens + the intense pressure of standardized tests in the state of New Jersey for why I wrote way too hard for so much of my life]). As far as bleed thru goes, there are different brands and types of paper that help mitigate this too. Even if you’re not using fountain pens, I would recommend trying different paper for more comfortable hand writing tasks.

Also, I’m sorry if it comes across as proselytizing. I just really like my current writing tools, and I spent a long time of my life hating my handwriting (and hating writing by hand because of how I’d cramp up). Because of that, I just want to share my experience with other methods

Reverendender,

I try to avoid purchases of tools to accommodate activities that I don’t do

Twelve20two,

Yeah, that’s fair. I suggest them only because they’re a bit easier on the hands

CumBroth,
@CumBroth@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

Musicians need pencils and erasers to work with sheet music. The music itself is printed, but you still need to write down fingering, dynamics markings, tempo markings, highlight ideas/themes/passages, etc…

krash,

Three is a certain quality to writing things down. It is a nice break from screens, makes you contemplate and elaborate on your thoughts. It works that way for me.

Dubious_Fart,

because I can write something down, right now, without trying to boot up a device, find an app, open a word processor, or anything.

and it stays, exactly as is. interuptions dont risk losing it. power outages wont make it disappear. dead batteries wont render it inaccessable. Software update wont render it corrupt.

BromSwolligans,

Writing and drawing aren’t lost arts, yet ;)

There’s strong evidence, by the by, that writing things down by hand works different parts of your brain than typing does. This can be great for somebody like me, with untreated attention issues, as writing things down by hand can help me remember them better. It takes longer to do, so your mind is on it longer, and particularly when I’m journaling, it seems to help me parse through what feels like a jumble of chaotic, circular thoughts by laying them down one word, one letter at a time on paper.

And since I write pretty much everyday, whether it’s notes at work, the occasional journal entry, or little notes for later in a nice Moleskine pocket notebook, I’d like that experience to be as nice as possible, in the same way a typist might invest in a mechanical keyboard (with just the right feeling and sound for their tastes) or anybody who can afford to will invest in a quality mattress, etc.

If you ever do give handwriting a shot, or if you get into art someday, you might check out some of the pencil and pen recommendations in the responses to this post. They can be a real treat when compared against, like, a standard no. 2 pencil you got in a box of 50 for $2.

featured,

Sugar alternatives like allulose and monkfruit have been making my life so much better recently. A little more pricey than sugar, but so much better for you and allows me to keep enjoying a sweet cup of tea in the morning without any of the downsides

LUHG_HANI,
@LUHG_HANI@lemmy.world avatar

Honey in tea is the bomb.

JimBeann,

A few years ago I read a post about self improvement where someone wrote about the concept of no-zero-days to form habits. It basically means you just need to do something meaningful every day to make it count, even if it’s something very small. Read one page in a book - no zero day, do 10k steps - no zero day…

Of all the things I read and tried in the past to change my behavior, get more active, learn new things etc, this by far worked the best for me and basically changed my life.

Right now I have 18 different habits I’m tracking on my phone. Things like reading, learning Spanish, doing chores, solving a puzzle on lichess, taking a cold shower, learning something about world affairs/history, taking care of my finances, meditating etc…

I don’t need to do all of them, one is enough. But because they require so little effort I quickly started to do more and developed habits I don’t need to force myself to do.

Now I have a 1500+ day streak on Duolingo and do 2-5 minutes of Spanish lessons every day. For more than 4 freaking years. This eventually ended up in visiting a language school in Spain last summer. One of my best vacations ever.

I read almost daily and found interest in new genres. I get enough exercise at least a few times a week. I educated myself about finances and now I don’t live paycheck to paycheck, paid off my debt and started to save something.

I later read about this concept in the book Atomic Habits and found variations of it in songs like Little Acorns by the White Stripes. In the end it’s about breaking things up into small, easy pieces so you don’t get overwhelmed or give up before you even start.

If anyone asks me what I swear by it’s this. It’s like magic.

ubermeisters,
@ubermeisters@lemmy.world avatar

No zero days + removing possessions that don’t bring you joy

JimBeann,

Good point. I guess I have a lot of stuff I can get rid of, donate, sell. I’ll focus on that in the future

SummitGnome,

deleted_by_author

    •
    JimBeann,

    Thanks, I’ll check that out. Currently I’m using the app Loop Habit Tracker which is not perfect but has widgets for every single habit which I can check off directly on my home screen

    CloverSi,

    Little Acorns! That was my first exposure to this concept. Could you tell me a little more about your experience starting out, and what sort of systems you use to help? Or point me in the direction of a post for further reading (would you recommend Atomic Habits?)? I’m overdue for a big change in my life and I’ve been thinking about how to approach things as someone terrible at following through, so this has me interested. I’m not quite sure where to start though.

    JimBeann,

    I think the reason why it worked so well for me from the beginning is because I really focused on the no-zero aspect. Make that your goal. You say you are ready for a big change. Break that up into the tiniest pieces. Be like the squirrel. If you haven’t already, make today a no-zero. If reading is something you want your future self doing regularly, grab a book and read one page. Done. If you want to be more educated look something up on wikipedia that you heard on the news but have no concept of (today for me that was austerity). Done. I guess that’s the secret. 0.01 is not zero. It’s not the big change you have in mind but it’s easy and doable. And over time these things become part of your identity. In a few weeks you are someone who reads regularly. Or someone who eats healthy stuff regularly. It’s not something you dream about it’s already who you are, no matter how much it is. Start with a few tiny things so you have different options to make it a no-zero and make sure to check at least one of them every day. Extend that pool of habits over time if you find new areas you want to improve on.

    It was also very helpful for me (at least for some habits) to not focus on certain actions but be a little more open. The 18 things I’m tracking in the app right now are represented by emojis. The house emoji means I do something in the household. Making my bed, doing the laundry, whatever. The credit card emoji means it’s about my finances. Putting some money to the side, investing in an ETF, reading something about budgeting… it gives me more options to check off that item and extends my habits over time.

    And I think it’s important to be kind to yourself. I have a few things I aim for but don’t check off a lot. Like writing a journal. I don’t feel bad about it. I can come back to it later when other things have become more automatic. I still improve in other areas and that’s fine.

    What I quickly stopped doing is tracking the ‘negative habits’ I see regularly in these apps. Like not watching netflix, not smoking, not eating junk food. In my opinion it’s way better to focus on the positives and more importantly it’s much easier. If I take a cold shower in the morning or do my Spanish lesson then that’s done. I’m already at no-zero and can focus on other things which is very rewarding.

    Yes, I can recommend the book. It goes more into detail about how habits are formed and about tactics how you can make it easier to develop them.

    But don’t wait for the book. Do the 0.01 today. One acorn at a time. Be like the squirrel.

    CloverSi,

    Thank you. I really appreciate you taking the time to go into detail for me.

    It’s not something you dream about it’s already who you are, no matter how much it is.

    I like this a lot. I’ll be getting that book - but today’s my first official no-zero day. Thanks again, wish me luck in gathering these acorns.

    PsychedSy,

    You can boost it a bit by tracking a few things that made you happy that day.

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