You don’t need a New Year to make a change. All you need is a Monday.

Your Monday morning thoughts set the tone for your whole week. See yourself getting stronger, and liv [Coach Tony]( Coach Tony [@tonystubblebine]( Your Monday morning thoughts set the tone for your whole week. See yourself getting stronger, and living a fulfilling, happier and healthier life. ~ Germany Kent _ Prompts for a 2-minute journaling session. If you only have time or energy for a short journaling session in the morning, try these three prompts. 1. “I will let go of…” 2. “I am grateful for…” 3. “I will focus on…” I collect and rotate in new journaling prompts all the time. Even similar prompts with slightly different wording can unlock a part of your inner life that you weren’t accessing. Source: [Two Minute Mornings]( and hat tip to [Gray Miller](’s [article](. The 85% Rule for optimal learning One of my regular goals is to be looking to achieve flow states. And to do that, you need to be able to modulate the challenge level of whatever you are working on. This research study, [The Eighty Five Percent Rule for optimal learning](, gives a good initial target for what that means: When we learn something new, like a language or musical instrument, we often seek challenges at the edge of our competence — not so hard that we are discouraged, but not so easy that we get bored. This simple intuition, that there is a sweet spot of difficulty, a ‘Goldilocks zone’, for motivation and learning is at the heart of modern teaching methods. Studies like this make me wonder, “When is this untrue?” Right away I think of skateboarders. The internet says it might take weeks or months to learn a kickflip. That’s a 99% failure rate then. So how does a skateboarder avoid discouragement? If you know, chime in. Goodbye, coffee (for now). I’m three weeks without caffeine. I started to think it was an unnecessary crutch, had a day that worked out where I couldn’t get any coffee, and just tried pushing that further. By the time I felt withdrawal symptoms on day four, I was already feeling committed. Hey, usually breaking habits is hard. But if you find yourself having an easy time of it, then take advantage. More on breaking up with coffee: Withdrawal symptoms usually set in about 12 to 24 hours after cessation of caffeine intake. Fortunately, it only takes [about nine days]( to get over a caffeine addiction and reset your tolerance, and the worst of the withdrawal symptoms will usually be behind you after two to three days. Those first few days can be quite unpleasant, however. Source: [A Very Thorough Guide to Quitting Coffee and Other Caffeine]( by [John Fawkes]( _ Had a great meeting last week with my newsletter coach. This is sort of meta to tell you about — both as background on how I think of this newsletter and how I think about using coaches myself. Coaching is not advice (usually), it’s facilitating. That means helping you find a way to get the best out of yourself. We are still very much focused on the process of quality. The first fifty issues were easy to write because I had a lot stored up to share. The next fifty were a challenge because I didn’t have any process. Now I have enough process that I can trust myself to write these consistently. That’s let us circle back to raising the quality bar. I often share a snippet with you and say something like “I file this under X.” The thing is that I actually do file these things away as part of filling in gaps in my own understanding. So my coach and I are talking through that — using the newsletter as part of a bigger mission. You might even say a Codex. Don’t miss out on the other issues by Coach Tony [Become a member for $5 per month]( Did you enjoy this issue? [Yes]( [No]( [Coach Tony]( Coach Tony [@tonystubblebine]( Tips, inspirations, and knowledge on productivity, happiness, health, and making an impact on our world. Official email of the Better Humans publication on Medium. (@bttrhumans) You can manage your subscription [here](. In order to unsubscribe, click [here](. If you were forwarded this newsletter and you like it, you can subscribe [here](. Created with [Revue by Twitter](.