I've been at this for 200 days...

It started in Bali.

I met a guy named Anthony and we stayed together for a couple of weeks.

There was an old barbell at our villa that couldn’t have weighed more than 25 lbs.

Every morning before we left, we’d do 50 bicep curls, 50 pushups, 50 tricep extensions, and jump rope until the other person finished their tricep extensions.

That was the whole routine.

There were mornings when one of us didn’t feel like doing it.

But here’s the funny thing about men: it’s almost impossible to just stand there and watch while someone else is working out in front of you.

All it took was for one of us to start. That was our entire accountability system. No app, no tracker, no agreement we ever actually spoke out loud.

One of the things I struggle with is inconsistency.

I start off strong, and then I fall off, usually because it gets too hard or I get bored of it.

When I returned to Canada, I tried to keep the routine going.

A few weeks in, I fell off it. Same as always.

I got sick of my own excuses.

I wanted to get stronger, and I wanted to do it consistently for once, so I made myself a promise: build a morning routine and make it stupid simple.

The idea was to give myself a floor, not a ceiling.

If I don’t end up making it to the gym that day, at least I’ve done something for myself. The bare minimum, done.

It’s the one promise I keep to myself. To do something for me every morning, no matter how small.

It’s day 200.

I just finished a hundred pike push-ups, a hundred squats, and a three-minute plank.

The workout evolved a lot since then, but the shape hasn’t. Something upper body. Something lower body. Something core.

Two hundred days sounds like a lot when you say it out loud.

It didn’t fix me though.

I’m still the same guy who fell off after three weeks the first time. I just built something that makes falling off harder to do than showing up.

1. Accountability doesn’t need to be complicated.

It’s almost impossible to stand there and watch someone else work out in front of you.

Anthony and I never built a system.
We had one unspoken rule: whoever moved first, the other one followed.

That was it.

And it worked every single morning for two weeks straight.

2. Make it stupid simple.

Hard and interesting is what kills a streak. Simple and boring is what survives it.

I know because I already ran the other experiment. I started strong, it got too hard or too boring, and I quit. More than once.

The version that’s lasted 200 days isn’t the impressive one. It’s the boring one I can do half asleep.

3. Learn to be adaptable. Design for imperfect days.

Day one you’ve got motivation to spare. Day 112, you’re tired, you’re running late, or you’re somewhere without the equipment you’re used to.

Some days I had to change the routine on the spot because I didn’t have what I needed. So I swapped the exercise and did the workout anyway.

A perfect day doesn’t test your streak. The imperfect ones do, and there are way more of those.

4. You don’t start impressive. You start small, and let it build.

I began with a 25 lb barbell and 50 curls in a villa in Bali.

Two hundred days later it’s a hundred pike push-ups and a hundred squats and a three-minute plank.

And the thing is, I was never a beginner. I could hold a plank for about two minutes back then. What I could never do was show up every day.

Starting small isn’t about what you’re capable of. It’s about picking something you can’t talk yourself out of.

5. It stopped being about getting stronger. It became about keeping my word.

Getting stronger was the original goal. That's the whole reason I made the promise in the first place.

But somewhere in the middle it turned into something else, more a test of mental resilience than a physical one.

There are still mornings I don't want to do it.

And on those mornings it isn't about the hundredth squat, it's about whether I'm the kind of person who keeps a promise to himself when nobody would know if I broke it.

The strength ended up being the side effect. The promise was the actual thing.

I finished version one of an app a few days ago, and I’m sharing it now instead of waiting until it feels ready.

Just the stupid simple system: something upper body, something lower body, something core, and a way to see the chain you’re building so you don’t want to break it.

I built it because I needed it, not because I figured out fitness. I’m not a trainer and I don’t have a background in this. I just have a passion for fitness and self-improvement.

It’s not perfect. That’s kind of the point. I’d rather ship it imperfect and improve it from there than sit on it until it’s ready, because ready never comes.

If you want a streak of your own, it’s here: UNBRKN. —https://app.theunbreakablemind.co

If you try it and something’s broken or missing, hit reply and tell me.

See you in two weeks,

— Chun