Progress

As I sat in my office yesterday, tackling task after task, I contemplated if I was really making progress toward my goals or was I just doing busywork to move the needle a bit for the day. It got me thinking about how we track making progress toward something. How do you know when you're making progress? What are the mile marks along the way of life? Is it mastering the mundane disciplines that are necessary to daily progression? Having a daily pattern of accomplishment? Or is it something else...? Starting a new hobby, setting a new goal with a plan to accomplish it, taking a break from the mundane...becoming new, doing something new?

While writing on this topic, I became stuck at the answer. My thoughts were all over the place about how I look at progress versus how I think I should look at progress; taking into consideration a perspective from my mother's point of view on my progress (a different perspective than my own but one that comes from love and pride for her daughter). What I consider progress for myself may not resonate the same to someone else and vice versa. 

So I am here to ask, what's your way of tracking your progress? Interact with me on this, in the name of research :) Is progress seeing your tasks/daily disciplines accomplished or is it something solid, like reaching a financial goal? In the search for the best work/life/health balance, how does progression fit into that? Do we constantly seek to progress higher in only one area or do we maintain a balance of progression through all avenues of life?

Have you ever felt like you were progressing in your health or your career, but regressing in your personal life? How can you maintain a positive outlook on progress in one area, if there is a regress in another? My advice to myself (and to anyone open to it) - celebrate the wins, big and small. Don't guilt yourself for losing balance. Make an effort to do something, even small, to progress your core values on a daily basis. The compound effect of those efforts will result in progress over time. Stay committed...