This is Day 30 in my 30-day blogging journey.

The origins of this journey can be found on Day 1.

Confession: I didn’t play by the rules.

If I had followed Seth Godin’s advice to the “T”, I would have spent 30 days profiling 30 of my favorite businesses and finding a way to improve some aspect of their business. I also would have turned comments off on the posts.

However, as I got started, I just didn’t feel called to do that.

I embraced the routine and some days flowed better than others.

What I found was that I did want to highlight businesses that I love, but I also wanted to take to task some business practices or philosophies that I struggled with.

True to Godin’s wish, it did help me look at my business through a different light and different lens.

As a consumer, I realized that I have always and will always cherish a personal touch.

As a consumer, I like to feel special from time to time (just not all the time).

I like having access to things that others may not, so having some degree of exclusivity can be nice.

Being able to recognize the work of authors, musicians, and fellow business owners was a pleasant change for me.

Those who follow my normal work know that much of what I write is focused around nutrition and coaching.

So, this journey allowed me to spread my wings a bit and write about things that might not normally make the cut for the website.

I was also happy to recognize the work of my coaches, my mother, and my business as we celebrated our 14th anniversary during this writing experiment.

It will be a refreshing change to reclaim some of my time that I’ve been spending over the last several weeks in writing to focus on continuing education and, if I’m being honest, start putting in more work on Book 3.

If there were a lesson I’d love for you to take from my 30-day experiment, it might be this: Find something that you can commit your energy to for 30 days.

Maybe it’s to focus on increasing your step count.

Or it’s being intent on hitting a minimum amount of water intake each day.

Maybe you’re going to ensure that you hit 5 servings of fruits and vegetables every day.

Or you’re going to make your sleep schedule consistent (waking and rising).

Maybe it’s a gratitude journal or gratitude practice.

Or maybe you’re going to spend each day unfollowing toxic social media influences from your feed.

Whatever it is, commit to it.

For 30 days, do that thing and do it with conviction.

Yes, you may have to make a compromise on other things in your life. It certainly wasn’t “easy” for me to write a blog every single day but that was the commitment I made to myself.

I didn’t do it for monetary gain.

I did it to expand my mind, my thoughts, my purpose in writing, how I view my business, and because I felt the challenge held value.

Of course, whatever you decide, perhaps you bend the rules a bit. I remained firm on the timeline but flexible with the content and approach.

Remember, it’s YOUR path. Some rules you follow, and some rules you bend.

Thank you for reading. I’ll resume my normal weekly output next week.

(Photo courtesy of Mark Duffel)