What To Do When The Wheels Fall Off

I've performed the routine thousands of times. Park far enough to the left to give me space on the right, open the back passenger door, remove the chair frame, unfold that frame, place the seat cushion, install the custom hard-back piece, and then get on with dominating yet another day. However, the universe threw a wrench into this tradition a few weeks ago. A new step inserted itself between removing the chair and unfolding the frame. Non-metaphorically, I will call this step "wheel falling off." You read that correctly. A wheel, one of the big ones actually, fell off of my wheelchair. Aside from the disappointment of being 25% closer to owning nothing more than a regular chair, the involuntary stoppage of my primary mode of transportation threw my day for quite a loop. My thought process upon seeing the wheel remaining in the back seat of my Honda while the frame was in my hand went something like this:

That is not good.

How am I going to make it to the gym?! (vanity always finds a way into things)

How am I going to make it to work?

Well, this is ironic, isn't it?

And lastly

Who do I hate enough to call at this early hour and demand a Formula 1-style tire change on my chair?

Eventually, through experience and, no doubt, some help from a higher power, I was able to get the wheel onto the frame. Then, it only felt like it was going to fall off, rather than actually falling off, while I wheeled into my apartment to grab what I needed before driving to the service center. Thankfully, the service center quickly fixed the issue and allowed me to get rolling on with my day.

Despite the quick service, the ordeal took the better part of a day. Add that to the fact that I had just gotten over the flu, and thus the mission for the previous ten days of my life had been to get by. The sickness and axel of evil on my wheelchair had combined to cause me to make zero progress on my goals during that period:

• No writing every day.
• No form of physical movement every day.
• No hitting my billables for the day.

And all of this wasn't even for a vacation! In his book Atomic Habits, James Clear recommends not missing two days in a row when you're trying to build a habit, let alone ten days. The wheels had fallen off on both my chair and my quarterly goals.

This wheel(s) falling off scenario is the kind that has kept me and many others from achieving their goals. It happens something like this. Life is rolling along smoothly. You've built a routine or habit to help you achieve your goals, and you feel good. Then, off with the wheels for a short time, and you never get back into the routine.

I can sense you shaking your head yes right now. I can also feel that you're about to ask: "But, Jake, what do I do?!"

Believe it or not, to recover from a wheel(s) off scenario, I have to go against my natural inclinations. As someone who is, at times, less than one standard deviation from a knuckle-dragger, my first instinct is to do all the things as before, but do them even harder to make up for the lost time. As the wiser among you (my tens of readers) probably guessed, burnout was inevitable anytime I would implement this tactic. Without fail, the wheels never fully get put back on. 

So, after much trial and error, I give you the secret to getting back on track that works for me (drumroll, please).

Start small.

I can hear the shocked gasps from readers who know me.

First, let me go over what starting small does not mean:

• It does not mean giving up on your goals.
• It does not mean permanently reducing the size or difficulty of your goals.
• It does not mean choosing new goals because they are easier.

What does it mean to start small? It means momentarily changing your routine to a simpler one so you can get back into your pre-wheel-removal swing.

Let's say you have a well-designed SMART goal of losing 10 pounds by a specific date. You've decided your best way to do this is to do two things regularly:

1. Track all of your meals via an app (Carbon is excellent).
2. Go to the gym five days a week.

You were doing both of these before the wheels came off. Now, restarting both feels like standing at the foot of a mountain while you search for the peak in the sky, only to see clouds.

Examples of starting small and simple with the above goals would be:

1. Instead of tracking every meal, you begin by only tracking dinner and dessert, the two meals you most likely overeat.
2. Instead of going to the gym five days a week, you make a goal to move five days a week. Moving could mean stretching, yoga, walking, or mowing the grass.

Starting small lets you put one foot in front of the other and climb that mountain.

The goal of starting small is to build smaller habits that get you back in the direction of your goals. Then, after a few weeks, you can ramp back up to your previous routines. Structuring things this way allows you to begin gaining momentum and instills the feeling of progress. A string of .05% better days compounding and slowly ramping up to 1% percent better days will always beat days of 0% and giving up.

I have implemented the start-small technique myself. My one or two regular readers (I won't besmirch them with the label loyal reader of my writing) may have noticed that I have not been posting at my regular cadence of once every two weeks. Even I, who writes about sticking to routines and habits, was not sticking to my practice or habit of writing. My writing wheels had fallen off even before my actual wheels had fallen off. I'll give you some credit and assume you realized that since you're reading this new post, you can tell I got back into the writing routine. I started small by telling myself I only had to write 25% of the words from my standard goal number. Then, the plan was to increase the number by 25% each week until I returned to my original number.

However, after a few consecutive days of writing, something happened: I didn't stop at the lower number and fulfilled my normal quota. Not only did I not have 0% days, I had 100% (and even more days). Now, the feelings of guilt and laziness are gone, and I look forward to sitting at my laptop for a peaceful few moments every day.

The above example demonstrates the power of starting small. You take one or two, or three steps in the right direction, and momentum takes over. You're back on track, and it is like you just had a quick pit stop.

Do you have any hacks for staying or getting on track? Please share them below so we can all add more tools to our toolbelt.

This post is also published on www.jakedenham.net