Build belief by recognising small wins — Try a 'Done List'
You’ve heard of ‘To-Do’ lists, you know about ‘To-Think’ lists, but how about a ‘Done’ list? When the inner critic gets the better of your inner coach, a ‘Done’ list turns the tide and helps you rediscover your resilience and shift your mindset into a growth mode.
At the end of your day — weekdays and weekends — look back and write down a small success you achieved in the last twenty-four hours.
It can come from any area of your life:
✅ ‘I experimented with some techniques I learnt from that You Can Now course’
✅ 'I submitted the client proposal ahead of time'
✅ 'I took the time to make myself a proper self-care meal'
✅ ‘I dusted off my shoes and went for an evening run’
Three helpful R's
To get the most from this exercise, Helen and Sarah recommend following these three steps.
Identify a success you’ve had today.
Write down your success in the same place, keep a pocket sized notebook of them if possible.
Review your successes daily, and look at what you can learn from them.
Whether you make Done lists a daily habit or use it every now and again, intentionally writing down your successes is key. As Helen and Sarah say in You Coach You - “identifying positive moments with written words feels much more valuable than when they live in our heads as thoughts or feelings.”
How can you start reflecting on your successes in a way that builds your confidence and cultivates a growth mindset?
Keen to dig deeper?
• Want more tips and tricks for rediscovering your resilience? Sign up for our punchy and purposeful Rethinking Resilience live course.
• In this bitesize video Coach and Trainer Catherine Allison introduces the concept of the inner coach and inner critic (and now to turn the latter down).
• We invited author and psychologist Ethan Kross to take us through his thinking on unhelpful inner monologues, drawn from his book Chatter. See his practical pointers here.
