The paperclip strategy: use a visual measurement of your progress to make it more satisfying.

A habit tracker is a thing where you track performing a habit. For example, marking days on a calendar. Ben Franklin had a booklet that he used to track how well he acted with 13 different virtues.

Habit tracking is obvious: it creates a trigger that naturally builds visual cues. Looking at the streak reminds you to act again.

Habit tracking keeps you honest. It helps you to really understand what is happening by putting the evidence right in front of you.

Habit tracking is attractive. The signal that we are making progress can have an addicting effect on motivation which can be very useful on a bad day, for example.

Habit tracking is satisfying. This is the most important benefit. Habit tracking becomes a reward on its own. It helps you stay focused on the process, rather than the result (focus on systems instead of goals).

Habit tracking provides visual proof you are becoming the type of person who you wish to become.

To make habit tracking easier, automate as much of it as possible. Manual tracking should be limited to your most important habits. Record each measurement immediately after the habit/behavior is performed. This combines habit stacking with habit tracking: after [habit], I will [habit tracking habit]. Even just a few weeks of measurements can be insightful.

No matter how consistent you are, it is inevitable that life will interrupt you at some point. The rule to follow is to never miss twice. You can miss a workout. Do not miss two in a row. The first mistake is not the one that will ruin you. Missing twice is the start of a new habit. Anyone can have a bad performance. Successful people rebound quickly when they fail. Do not fall into an all or nothing cycle with your habits. It is valuable to just show up on your bad or busy days. The first rule of compounding: never interrupt it unnecessarily. Bad workouts continue to accrue the compounding. It's also about being the type of person to not miss workouts. It is crucial to show up when you don't feel like it.

It is inevitable that life will interrupt your streak when habit tracking: showing up when you don't feel like it and never missing twice in a row are crucial to reinforcing the good identity you are or want to become.

Another potential danger is measuring the wrong thing. If you were running a restaurant and only tracked revenue, the food could be getting worse as you were putting more effort into marketing, and you wouldn't realize that the food was getting worse. Do not care more about taking 10,000 steps than being healthy. We tend to optimize for what we measure. Goodhart's law: when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure. It's crucial to keep habit tracking in its proper place. Think of "non-scale victories" in weight loss while the scale doesn't budge. Habit tracking is a simple way to make your habits more satisfying.