Since we are now in February, it’s time to report on the 2013 resolution I made public in my blog post First 2013 Resolution — A Regular Yoga Practice posted on Dec 30. As I wrote then,  one of my primary life goals is to be strong, supple and agile at 85 and I’m convinced nothing is better for that than a combination of swimming and yoga.

I’ve had no problem maintaining a regular swimming practice, but with yoga I’ve been far more spotty. I took a class on Dec 27. Prior to that I’d not attended a class in four months. And I’ve always lacked the discipline to practice regularly on my own. When I’ve gotten into a steady rhythm, it’s been by attending classes.

In choosing this as a resolution I hoped to improve on my discipline, so I wouldn’t require the reinforcement of others plus a teacher to practice.

In an earlier post, A ‘Recipe’ for Successful Resolutions one tip I cited was Small is Beautiful. Set modest resolutions to enhance your chances at success. So I resolved at first to do yoga for just five consecutive days, and for only 25 minutes each day. Starting with that that class on Dec 27, I achieved my resolution of 5 consecutive days on Jan 1. Three of those days had been home practice.

With my only resolution already achieved on the first day of the year, I decided to carry on, resetting the goal to practice yoga at least 5 days a week throughout the month. With January over, here’s how I did: I practiced yoga 26 days out of 31, never skipped more than one day, and today was my 11th consecutive day of practice, carrying a streak into a new month, as I had at the beginning of January.

Besides setting a modest goal, I also set up a reward system, marking each day’s practice on a calendar, using a code like YH25 (Yoga, Home, 25 min). I got jazzed filling in the boxes on the calendar page. And since I recorded how many minutes I practiced, I also know I practiced for a total of 12 hours and 35 minutes last month.

To aid my resolve, I also worked yoga into my daily writing routine. I set a timer for 50 minute intervals of writing. After completing each interval, I would often take a 10-minute yoga break, before starting on my next 50-minute writing interval. I found the yoga breaks mentally and physically refreshing, making it easier to keep up my writing schedule. In the end, it didn’t take discipline at all. It becane something I enjoyed and looked forward to — as I already do to the 30 minutes I’ll do early tomorrow.

Since one characteristic of the Expert Mind is to reset goals at a higher level once achieved, my Feb goal is to practice for 5 days out of 7 again but for a minimum of 30 minutes.  To maintain my streak, on at least two days I had to pull out my yoga mat and do my 25 minutes just before going to bed. But it never felt like a chore. In fact, it’s starting to feel like a habit.