Early 2017 I got an Apple Watch. I wasn’t fussed about them at the time as I never normally wear a watch of any sort. But when my husband didn’t want his any more, I thought I’d give it a go. A few months later and I was addicted. While I used the word lightly at the time, what really worked for me were the regular achievements and challenges. It was the same thing that got me hooked into World of Warcraft many years ago1 and I know that if I do something, I throw everything at it, but once I can’t complete a challenge I usually drop something. After my initial post about the watch I found myself in a situation where I couldn’t achieve the challenges. Towards the end of 2017 I had a few too many days in front of the computer with work and just wasn’t active. What I noticed was that as soon as I missed a day of activity, and thus I couldn’t get a “perfect month” achievement, I stopped even trying to be active until the start of the next month. If there was no reward, even a completely irrelevant badge in an app, then why try… Long term health benefits don’t give the same level of accomplishment in the short term for most people, myself included. So after a particularly gluttonous December 2017 I made myself a promise. Continue reading A year of Apple Watch addiction and motivation