The Power of the 100-days Challenge

The Power of the 100-days Challenge

Earlier this year, I decided to stop contemplating the idea of committing the #100DaysOfCode challenge and actually get into it. Unfortunately, I only survived the first day due to some reasons, which undoubtedly include the lack of time management and a clear outlook of what tasks I should engage in during the challenge.

However, instead of giving up on the coding challenge, I came up with another one: Blogging.

I found that coding for a 100 days is somewhat challenging without strict discipline, but writing does not seem that hard. So I started to write on Medium every day and document my progress and, surprisingly, I haven’t missed any single day. I was amazed — and still am — at how simple yet motivating it is to be tied to a commitment that spans as many as a hundred days and to actually anticipate each day.

I did not stop at this challenge. I decided to commit to a 100-day reading challenge (I’m on day 37 as of the time of publishing this article) and I have a growing list of upcoming challenges, which I have yet to start once I achieve the goal of the current challenges. I’m aware that committing to too much work at the same time might have undesired results.

Why can this simple challenge be so effective?

There are some factors that I believe makes this challenge ideal if you aim to be more productive and achieve your goals:

• Breaking the goal into small daily tasks: when you work on small manageable tasks everyday, you encourage consistency.
• Accountability: you’re publicly committed to this challenge, so you’re introducing a sense of accountability so you’re likely to stick to the daily tasks.
• Satisfaction: completing a task and looking back at the checked (and unchecked) boxes everyday provides instant gratification and a sense of achievement.

What exactly is the idea of this challenge?

The 100 days challenge is a way to publicly commit to a particular habit for a hundred days, where you engage in a daily habit and update your progress on social media.

It was originally started as a #100DaysOfCode campaign focusing on coding and encouraging developers to be more productive. It later expanded to include other habits including journalling, reading, writing, cooking and more. You can check out the list of challenges here.

How do you join this challenge?

This is as simple as dedicating a fixed period of time daily to a habit then keep it going for a hundred days. However, if you keen on doing it the conventional way, you can follow these steps:

• Pick a habit you’d like to practice or a skill that you need to learn.
• Post a tweet on X/twitter where you announce that you’ll be starting the challenge.
• Post an update on your progress everyday.

100 Days of Habits & Skills

Aside from the link I shared earlier, I would like to suggest a list of challenges. Of course you can start your own challenge based on the field that interests you.

Who are these challenges for?

As you will see, these challenges are not limited to a certain field. They cover health and creativity aspects of our lives, in addition to challenges for developers.

Does it have to be 100 days?

While the challenge is intended for a hundred days, you can take it as a reference and re-define the rules based on your convenience and abilities. After all, the objective of this challenge is to improve your life through daily habits.

Let’s get right into it:

Personal Habits

It’s often hard to stick to positive habits due to various reasons. This is why I dedicated a section for personal habits.

Reading

Like any other habit, it’s best to set a goal that you believe is within your abilities. The easier the habit, the more likely you’ll stick to it, as James Clear says in Atomic Habits. I try to read at least 10 pages a day, although I occasionally dive below that. What should you read? Books, articles, poetry, etc.

Writing

If you aspire to be a writer or you’re skilled at writing, it’s helpful to dedicate some of your time to converting your ideas to blog posts. If you don’t have a blog, there are plenty of popular blogs that you can post on, including Blogger and Medium. You can also write tweets, or even a book.

Journaling

I started a journaling challenge because I initially struggled to keep a daily journal despite the multiple attempts to stick to it. I was simply not in the mood for writing, even though I like the idea of pouring my thoughts onto paper. However, committing to this challenge instantly changed my mind and I started enjoying the daily routine of opening my notebook and jotting down whatever is on my mind. There are interesting journalling mobile apps that you can try out but I personally find the feel of a pen on a physical notebook more appealing and I recommend it.

Coding

As a developer, you’re constantly learning new things. It’s crucial to optimize your time and effort to get the most out of what you learn.

Learning a programming language

If you’re feeling lost while trying to learn a programming language like Java, Python or Javascript, use this challenge to learn more efficiently. You can use the official #100DaysOfCode hashtag for this challenge. When it comes to programming languages, it’s important to put more emphasis on fundamentals as well as practicing to apply what you’ve just learned. Solve programming exercises and work on a project. Don’t focus all of your time on only watching the tutorial or reading an article. You need to practice.

resources:

Get Started with Java MOOC Java Introduction to Spring Framework Spring Academy’s Spring boot tutorials Freecodecamp For more resources, checkout my github repository here.

Learning Cloud Concepts

The tech market has seen a significant shift into the cloud. It’s not only that many companies are moving their businesses to the digital space, there is also a move towards cloud solutions. As a developer, you should take advantage of this advancement and learn any cloud related skills. Learn about Amazon Web Services (AWS), Azure and Google Cloud Services (GCS) and obtain cloud certifications.

resources:

AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner Certification Course (CLF-C02) — Pass the Exam! AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner CLF-C02

Data Structures and Algorithms

Data Structures and Algorithms are fundamental to programming and they’re essential in any programming language.

resources: Data Structures and Algorithms with Visualizations — Full Course (Java)

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

This is another revolutionary technology that has been the primary subject everywhere since the introduction of ChatGPT-3. The 100daysai website offers daily lessons on Artificial Intelligence which are set to start on April. However, you don’t have to restrict yourself to one source.

Learn CS50

This is a subject that I had to include because first of all, Harvard university offers a free course on CS50 which is available on youtube here via freecodecamp’s channel. The other reason I believe it should have it’s own 100-day challenge is that the course is almost 26 hours long, so you will probably need considerable amount of time to consume it properly based on your familiarity with the material and the time you can commit each day.

workout

Health is the most important aspect of our lives. We often don’t engage in healthy habits or we practice unhealthy ones. Below I added some daily workouts but feel free to include more.

Do 20 squats

You can increase or decrease the daily number of squats.

The 2-minute plank exercise

This exercise may get easier over time, so you may increase the time if you feel you can do more.

Walk 10,000 steps

If you feel this is more challenging than you can commit to, you can go with fewer steps.

Final Thoughts

One thing I always try to keep in mind is to not count on motivation in the attempt to accomplish goals. Consistency is crucial in this aspect and it’s mainly possible when the mentality shifts from motivation-driver to system-driver. This topic has been the subject of many books, talks, podcasts, and what they’re essentially agreeing on - at least from my understanding - is that relying on motivation and that dopamine burst you get when you feel excited about something is not gauranteed to last. Focus on the system, on the process that keeps you on track every day with less effort than running solely after goals. This 100-day challenge, in my opinion, does contribute to the system-driver mindset, which is why I found it very effective.

Thanks for reading!