Project 365

In case you’re new around here, I do this little thing called a “Project 365“. You can find all my photos from this year (2019) on write.as with the #project365 tag.

Note: I recently moved to using write.as for blogging because it’s such a simple interface and uses Markdown. I’ll likely keep it … but we’ll see.

Every year I have friends ask if I’m still going to do one next year. Turns out 2019 was the fourth year I’ve done a Project 365. Daaaang. So at this point, it’s such a habit for me, I’m not sure I can stop. So, I thought I’d share my past projects and my “process” in case anybody else wants to join me.

My process

  1. Create your why – Decide why you want to commit to this. Is it to share your life with friends and family? Is it to have a year of photos to look back at and review/remember? Is it just to see if you can do it? Figure out WHY you want to do this because then you’re more likely to do it.
  2. Take pictures – You already do it, but you have to force yourself to start looking at things. Notice interesting, funny, or even boring things. Things that represent your day.
  3. Decide your platform – I post all my photos to Instagram which posts to Facebook for my friends and family. I then post the same photo here on the blog which pushes to Twitter
  4. Schedule it – Decide when you’ll post your photo and put it on your calendar! I had a reminder pop up on my phone the first year … now it’s just part of my night-time routine.
  5. Have fun – Don’t beat yourself up if you miss a day or forget to take a photo. I’ve posted plenty of “old” photos from several days prior to fill in a day. I’ve also gone back to fill in a day I missed. Remember your why.

That’s pretty much it. The simplest Project 365 can literally be one photo a day thrown into a journal or on Instagram or something. You’ll see I mixed it up after I completed my first one …

Past Project 365s

2015 Project 365 – This was my first year doing the challenge.

4 in 44 – This was my second challenge, but didn’t follow the calendar year. I needed a break, but then sort of missed the photos. So I started a 4in44 challenge to post 4 photos every day of my 44th year on the planet.

2018 Project 365 – I took another break after my “4in44” and then aligned with the calendar year again. I didn’t want to just post one photo, but four was tough sometimes. I settled on three photos every day.

2019 Project 365 – The 2018 Project really solidified the habit of taking and posting photos … so I just kept it up. The only real change was moving from hosting on Tumblr to hosting on write.as. I do like the “archive” feature of Tumblr to be able to view all the photos on one page … so I might go back to that next year (tomorrow).

That’s it … now you can look back through my last four-ish years and get a better picture of who I am. If you decide to start a Project 365, let me know over on Twitter … I would love to follow along!