They say it takes six weeks to make a new habit. I think there’s truth in that, but not complete truth.

In fact, it takes three days to set a new course of behavior. It takes six weeks to make it routine enough that you begin to have confidence it will be a keeper. It takes a year to lock it in.

The first three days are crucial. The first day you’re geared up for the challenge, self-discipline armed and ready to work. It turns out to be easier than you thought it would be. So you enter the second day a bit cockily, and of course it proceeds to be more difficult. By the third morning you’ve leveled, you’re at work with two days of progress behind you: you have entered the zone.

Like raindrops running down a window pane
to make a puddle on the lowest sill,
like yarn that’s raveled in a curly chain
to form a knotless cloth against the chill,
like beads pulled one by one upon a string,
together building jewelry out of spheres,
like minutes massing into months, that bring
us spinning through the incidental years,
so I need triple days to form a trend.
The first a point, the next a line implies.
It takes a third to make the series bend
and give direction where intention lies.
I therefore name today the glad director
that indicates my three days form a vector.