For the last five days, several people joined me in the Ditch Your Cell in the Morning Challenge. I started this challenge because, although I have an amazing morning routine of meditation and gratitude, I was easily getting distracted by my phone. Together, we learned what it was like to put our cell phones on airplane mode before going to bed at night and keeping it in that mode for one hour the following morning.

In doing this challenge, I received emails from many people who were participating. From them, I learned that they found more time in their mornings to spend with loved ones, had more peace, spent more time than usual dedicated to their own growth and goals. It’s incredible what we can achieve in one hour without our phones!

Based on what we learned from the challenge, I’ve summarized what we collectively did during the last five days.

Focus

Rather than focusing on what we ought to be doing or being distracted by social media, we were able to focus on what was happening in the present moment. With today’s busy world, this can be challenging to do. As a result, we noticed a decrease in anxiety and an increase in peace.

Commitment

By committing to the challenge, many of us went longer than one hour in airplane mode and had additional hours of peace that carried us through the day. Commitment helps confidence develop because when we follow through on what we say we’re going to do, our confidence levels go up.

Action

How many times have we said that we’re going to do something – workout, eat less sugar, be more social, etc. – and not achieve what we set out to do? Then, the next time we want to do something similar, we opt not to do it because we’re fearful we’ll fail.

With this challenge, it was bit-sized enough for a large number of people to do. Taking action in one area of your life can carry over into other areas. I heard from many people who told me they accomplished a lot more than they usually do in the morning. To do lists were being completed in the early morning hours!

Immediate Results

I received emails on the first day about results people were having. I noticed immediate results as well. Results motivate us to continue, especially when we’re receiving more pleasure by the new habit.

Variety of Mornings

In doing this challenge over weekday and weekend mornings, we were able to put this new habit in place whether we were in a regular weekday routine or a weekend one. Having that variety will set us up for success going forward, if we choose to continue reducing our cell phone use.

Based on these findings, this simple challenge is an example of how we can lay the foundation to create new habits, to get us closer to what we want in our lives. If you have delayed starting something that keeps calling you to it, use your experience from this challenge to put action steps into place. You don’t need a huge chunk of time to dedicate to something to get started – we proved that together. Pick one small thing to start and do that.

I am grateful to the people who committed to this challenge and shared their experience with me. When we connect and form a community around a common goal, we get to learn and grow through the experience together.