The Daily Dial In

There are certain numbers that mean a lot to us.

• Personal dates: your wedding anniversary, family birthdays, the date someone special died
• Sporting numbers: Michael Jordan is synonymous with the 23 vest. Ronaldo thinks he’s got tabs on the number 7, he’s even trademarked CR7, but for me it will always belong to Cantona.
• Cultural: We all know what we were doing on 9/11 and most of us make plans for the 25th December far in advance.
• Literary: The 39 Steps, Catch 22, and the number 42 from the Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy all have resonance for me.

We have no problem remembering numbers like these.

Hanging On The Telephone

And then there’s your phone number. You probably know that long random sequence of digits off by heart. In fact these days it might well be the only phone number you know off by heart.

In the old days you’d have memorised a whole bunch of telephone numbers. These were the numbers of family, friends and colleagues. 

Well, technically that’s not quite true. They were in fact the numbers of the buildings in which your family, friends and colleagues dwelled. In the old days we didn’t ring each other up. We rang someone’s house and hoped they were in it.

Anyway, that’s all gone. All those numbers have changed and everyone’s got a mobile number. And now you don’t know any of them because they’re just stored within the contact details of your phone.

The Number Of The Beast

The only telephone number you now know off by heart is your own. And we’re going to use that familiarity today for a concept that could help you to move forward on some of your most immediate goals. 

This idea is called The Daily Dial In. Let me know what you think of it - good or bad. 

If enough people like it I’ll write a short book on it. 

Or if enough people say it’s rubbish I’ll forget about it!

Either way here it is. 

Ring, Ring, Why Don't You Give Me A Call?

You use your personal telephone number to complete a daily dial in and check in with your goals that have a numerical value associated with them. How so?

Let’s say your number is 07515 316027 and your current goals are based around becoming more productive, healthier and fitter.

Combining the two you could set these following regular activities to achieve on a daily basis.

• 0 = units of alcohol (Sunday to Thursday)
• 7 = minutes of stretching and core exercises
• 5 = minutes to set the table i.e. prep your desk, decide your priorities for the day
• 15 = minutes of meditation
• 3 = Decide on the top three, must complete, finish at all costs, to do items for the day
• 1 = mile run 
• 60 = minutes of writing
• 27 = minutes of reading fiction 

You know your number off by heart so it’s a really easy roll call through the numbers to check in with yourself and ensure that you’re on point.

Any time of the day mentally scroll through your telephone number and you’ve got immediate access to your daily goals.

Your personal number is an immediate automatic reminder to motivate you to achieve the goals you’ve set for yourself. The goals that will take you forward.

Sorry, Wrong Number

Let’s say your number doesn’t easily fit with the activities you’d like to prioritise. Now what?

No problemo. Just create a new number that works more easily with the daily goals you want to complete.

I think it will still work best if it really looks and sounds like a genuine number. Let’s use a London number as an example to play with. All London numbers are prefixed with the digits 020 and are 11 digits long in total.

You could have eleven different goals but I think that it’s nice to mix it up and have two or three digits at a time representing a single goal.

I’ve randomly created this number: 020 7527 1043 so let’s see what we could do with it.

• 0 = A big fat zero can always be something you want to do less of or quit completely like cigarettes, biscuits or biting your nails. Or arriving (or leaving) work 0 minutes late.
• 20 = I think it's useful to use some nice round digits for your new number. 20 minutes of language learning a day for example.
• 75 = kilos might be the ideal weight you’re aiming for. How much closer are you today? Checking in today could act as motivation for what you need to do today to be closer to that number tomorrow?
• 27 = You could use a number like this to nudge yourself into a new habit a certain number of times out of another number. 27 could be a reminder that you want to eat veggie or vegan even, on two out of the seven days a week. 35 could be a reminder to go to the gym on your working lunch break three days out of five.
• 10 = Sales calls you want to make every day. Take ten minutes every day to check in with a friend or family member. If you did this once every day on a monthly basis that means you could keep in touch with thirty different people at least once a month.
• 43 = minutes working on your latest project. In reality you’ll probably spend 45 minutes on it but assigning 43 minutes could make it more memorable.

Call Me, Call Me Anytime

When do you do your daily dial in? That’s up to you. 

It might be better for you to dial in first thing on a morning. 

Or making that call last thing at night to ensure you’ve ticked all the boxes might work best. 

Perhaps checking in midway through the day is going to have the most positive effect. 

Or maybe you’ll need to make a number of calls throughout the day to ensure you keep on track.

Play around and find whatever works for you. 

You Know My Name (Look Up The Number)

The only problem with this second, manufactured number is that you’ve now got a new number you need to remember.

Well, you already know your own mobile number so learning just one more isn’t going to too long to is it?

Especially when you’ve already got an inbuilt mnemonic to learn it from. The actual activities themselves can act as memory pegs. Ideal!

This coming weekend enjoy looking at your own telephone number, breaking it down and associating goals with the individual digits. Or making a new number up from scratch so that you can make your daily dial in. 

Let me know how it goes and do leave a comment below to let me know if you’d like a free copy of the Daily Dial In. If you do then I’ll write it!