The don’t break the chain thing is nice. I’ve used it a few times, but it can be very demotivational when you had a super long chain and you broke it. It’s very hard to get momentum again.
If you time it right, you end up with weekdays for work and weekends for rest.
From the article:
> While most people get demotivated and off–track after a bad performance, a bad workout, or simply a bad day at work, top performers settle right back into their pattern the next day.
I think that’s the key (which I’ve not mastered). With things like Alcoholics Anonymous, meditation practice, etc. they say “If you break the chain, then don’t beat yourself up, just start again”. But obviously if keeping up the streak is a big part of the motivation, then once it’s broken that’s going to demotivate.
This helps me not feel bad when I miss a day, but still gives me the feeling of don't break the chain. I've been doing it for about 3 months and I'll see if it continues to works out :)
There's also the Duolingo "streak freeze" - give yourself a couple of freeze tokens in reserve that you can use if you miss a day. Give yourself a way to earn streak freeze tokens again if you use one (eg maybe if you get 30 days in a row again). I'm currently on a 2000+ day streak on Duolingo, and while I've definitely missed days over those 5+ years, the streak freezes mean I've never missed more than a day in a row over that time. Gives an incentive to regroup and restart immediately if you do break the chain, rather than losing all motivation.
Of course not breaking the chain demands a certain precondition, let not getting sick. Not neglecting minor chores daily, that they might some day take a week of your time. Things like that.
That given, its generally hard to break the chain. In fact it might become something like addiction after a while, a.k.a habit.