Cold Showers

Filed Under: All Posts, Kristi on August 3, 2008

I took cold showers every morning for 22 months of my life. Not just slightly cool showers, but absolutely-no-hot-water-at-all showers. If you don’t know from my previous blogs, I used to sell books door-to-door during the summers when I was in college. During sales school that first summer, our manager told us that if we wanted to be successful on the book field, we needed to take a cold shower each morning. I didn’t cheat ever, and in those few months I made more money than most college students ever make. Cold showers were not something I enjoyed, but they certainly jump-started my day and kept me from lingering in the bathroom.

One of the quotes that I posted everywhere was “Successful people make a habit of doing things unsuccessful people don’t like to do.” It seems like a great motivation even 15 years later. My oldest son, Kade, learned the truth in that quote this summer. He worked with his breeding heifer, Daisy, every day. He rinsed her and put her in the cool barn. Sometimes he wasn’t very motivated to do it and had to have an extra push from me, but he and Daisy became good friends through it all. This last week, Kade was very successful at the county fair with his calf. I know that results like that aren’t always the case, but it was a good lesson for an 8-year old.

I certainly have some habits. Some of my habits have become so ingrained that I don’t even realize I do them. . . I drink Diet Coke everyday and eat at least some chocolate. I start writing after 10 o’clock p.m. because that is when I do my best work. I function generally well on less than 6 hours of sleep a night. I make a list of what I need to accomplish and check it off as I go.

What habits have you developed that are making you successful? Is there something that you don’t like to do that if you made it your habit would significantly improve your life? Choose something that unsuccessful people don’t like doing and make it your habit and you will see success!