Opinions vary on how long to track a new habit, but I think the best use of Coach.me is to establish a new positive habit. And, given our limited willpower and cognitive space, it works best to focus on just a few at a time. So I’ve adopted the strategy of no longer tracking some habits once they’re established.

Examples of habits I no longer track in Coach.me:

Flossing: this was a no brainer. Once I was religiously flossing all my teeth every night, it was just a waste of time to check into this.

Cold showers: I’ve grown to like cold showers. It can still be difficult, if it’s a chilly morning and I’ve just crawled out of a warm bed, to turn the water on full-cold, but my body seems to have grown a taste for it. I always feel refreshed afterwards, and warm showers always leave me feeling over-hot. So I’ve created a lasting change, and tracking it is just a distraction.

Likewise, take supplements, and eat 30 grams of protein within 30 minutes of waking are binary behaviors – either I do them or not, so once I’m doing them habitually, I drop the tracking to allow me to focus on others.

I’ve also dropped a few habits that I just couldn’t seem to establish, and thus realized my heart wasn’t in them. My options were to change something fundamental about my approach, or cut them to improve focus.

I stopped tracking learn a foreign language only because Duolingo debuted its coaching feature which handles the tracking for me.

I will probably always track exercise because it’s all about improvements. Higher weights, more rounds finished, greater distance, lower time, etc.

One non-binary habit I nonetheless stopped tracking is stretching. I started with one sun salutation after applying deodorant in the morning (followers of BJ Fogg will recognize this Tiny Habit method) and then went to two, then three. After almost a year at three, I’ve recently upped it to four. I also religiously do five before working out, and do static stretches after working out. But I stopped tracking long ago. It wasn’t really conscious, but upon reflection, I think it’s because I’m content to improve it slowly, and I don’t need help to remember my current level.

So if you’re still tracking 8 or more habits, you might want to see if any of them can be pruned.