My Semi Sorted Life
The challenge
Semi Sorted 73
73 days of becoming, across Home, Heart, Body and Soul. One rule, a colouring-page game you fill in as you go, and absolutely no streak-shaming. This is the anti-punishment challenge, and you can start it any day you like.
Why 73?
A season, not a sentence
A 73-day season is short enough to hold and long enough to change something. The year is built from them: four 73-day seasons, run during the school terms, with the resets falling in the school holidays and a wind down over Christmas and New Year. Holidays are when routines fall over anyway, so that's where the resets live.
This isn't a one-off challenge you survive and then abandon. It's a rhythm the calendar runs on, so the habits you build actually have somewhere to live afterwards. The "new year" feeling, several times a year.
And yes, it's two days shorter than a certain punishing challenge. That's not an accident. New to the whole rhythms idea? Read why rhythms beat routines, it's the thinking behind everything here.
The one rule
Never miss three days in a row.
That's it. That's the whole rule. Two days off is grace, not failure. Day three is a choice. No streaks, because streaks punish. Rhythms forgive.
Home, Heart, Body & Soul
Four pillars, one whole life
The pillars aren't a to-do list. They're the four wheels on the car. They don't need equal air every day, but ignore one for long enough and the whole ride gets wobbly.
{Home}
Your space, your money, your meals. A calmer home lowers the noise on everything else, which is why it's usually the easiest place to start.
{Heart}
Your people: partner, kids, friends, community. Connection is the first thing to slip when life gets loud, and the thing you feel most when it's gone.
{Body}
Physical and mental health, movement, sleep, energy. You can't pour from empty, and midlife bodies renegotiate the deal without asking first.
{Soul}
Growth, creativity, learning, spirituality, the why. The part that's you, not just the roles you fill. It has to be intentional or it never happens.
The goal was never equal time in each. It's a regular check-in with all four, so the squeaky wheel gets noticed before it falls off. When life feels off, one of these four is usually where. That's the balanced ride.
It's a game now
Every day colours the picture
You're never choosing pass or fail. Every scored day earns XP and colours a piece of your season picture, so the only question is how much of it today earned. Skipping isn't punished, the picture just doesn't grow, and the picture is the whole point.
Did Something
5 XP · 1 piece. The semi sorted day: one real rhythm in each pillar, 15 to 30 minutes all up. Most days land here, and that's exactly the point.
Nailed It
10 XP · 2 pieces. The sorted day: the full rhythm, when capacity allows. A bonus, never the expectation, and it colours two pieces in two different pillars.
Grace Card
0 XP · the picture rests. Life happened and you played a card on purpose. Streak safe, logged, zero shame. Four cards in hand, and a Clean Sweep Sunday wins one back.
You still build your own version of each day across the four pillars: {Home} · {Heart} · {Body} · {Soul}. If you couldn't do a rhythm on a 6/10 day, it's too big, so shrink it until you could. The old "Ugh, Fine" tier has retired: those two-minute minimums are simply what you do on a Grace Card day to be kind to tomorrow-you.
The tracker is the picture
One colouring page on the fridge
The tracker is a single printable: a storybook cottage built from 91 numbered stones. Every 5 XP colours the next stone in order, in the colour of whichever pillar worked hardest that day. No deciding at night, ever, the page always knows what's next.
By Day 73 the cottage isn't just finished or unfinished. It's a birdseye view of where your season actually went. Come out nearly all one colour and you'll know exactly which pillar you leaned on and which you forgot. The picture keeps you honest across all four, not just busy in one.
Each piece is coloured in that day's hardest-working pillar colour, and a Nailed It day's two pieces must be two different pillars. Some pieces can't be bought with XP at all: the windows light up as you level, chimney smoke appears after three Clean Sweep Sundays, the cat only colours in after your first comeback week, and the sleeping dog is Day 73's piece, whatever the score. Because of course it does.
Ten levels, quick wins early
The ladder is front-loaded, so the first levels come fast. Each season's target is 350 XP: Level 10, Season Legend, which colours the heart above the door. About five scored days a week gets you there.
| L1 | Beginner | 0 XP |
| L2 | Finding Your Feet | 25 XP |
| L3 | Getting Momentum | 50 XP |
| L4 | On a Roll | 75 XP |
| L5 | Semi Sorted | 100 XP |
| L6 | Consistent | 150 XP |
| L7 | Thriving | 200 XP |
| L8 | Unstoppable | 250 XP |
| L9 | Cottage Keeper | 300 XP |
| L10 | Season Legend | 350 XP |
XP never resets and can't be lost. Past 350 the picture keeps going to 455 (Beyond Sorted), and the heart gets coloured on Day 73 no matter the score, because finishing a season is the win.
Sundays are Boss Battles
Every Sunday brings four bosses, one for each pillar: the Kitchen Boss, the Birthday Admin Boss, the Appointment Boss (that GP booking you keep dodging), the Inbox Boss. Each one is a 15 to 30 minute job, so you can take on all four in one Sunday sitting.
Every boss you beat colours one extra stone in that pillar's colour. Beat all four for a Clean Sweep and win back one spent Grace Card. A bad week isn't a hole, it's a comeback setup.
Four Grace Cards, played on purpose
One card in each pillar colour, and any card covers anything. Cover a pillar when three rhythms happened but one had nothing left, and the day still scores its 5 XP. Cover a day when the whole thing fell over: 0 XP, streak safe, zero shame. They're limited, so they mean something. The one rule never moves: never miss three days in a row.
The whole point
From rhythms to habits to a lifestyle
The challenge isn't the goal. The life after it is. Every rhythm on your tracker is a habit in the making, and the tracker is a nursery, not a home.
1 · A rhythm
You're doing it on purpose. It needs the tracker, the colouring-in, the deliberate effort. That's not weakness, that's what new behaviours look like. Everything starts here, tiny and tended.
2 · A habit
It's doing itself. The landmark research on habit formation (Lally et al., University College London, 2010) found behaviours take on average about 66 days of repetition to become automatic, not the mythical 21. A 73-day season is longer than that average, on purpose. The same study found missing a single day made no measurable difference, which is why the one rule allows two.
3 · A lifestyle
It's just who you are. Habits pile up season after season while the tracker never gets heavier. A few seasons in, you're not someone trying to walk every day. You're someone who walks. James Clear calls this identity-based habits in Atomic Habits. Around here we call it always becoming, made real.
How the habits actually last
The graduation mechanic
At the end of each season, look at your four rhythms and ask: which one happened even on the bad days, without me deciding to? That one graduates off the tracker. It's a habit now, it's just life, and a new rhythm takes its empty slot.
You only ever "work on" four things, but the life underneath keeps accumulating: a couple of graduations a season adds up to a genuinely different life within a year or two, without a single punishing challenge. The goal was never a bigger list. It's an emptier one.
Every Sunday: the check-in
Five minutes, honest as you can be.
How did the week actually go? What's worth remembering? What are you going into next week with? Do any rhythms need adjusting? Adjusting isn't failing. It's the point.
The road to 2027
The seasons
New rhythm for the calendar: four seasons a year, with the resets landing in the school holidays, because that's when routines fall over anyway. Ride along with these dates, or build your own season just below.
Mon 5 October – Wed 16 December 2026 · 73 days
The final season of 2026, and my field test for the printable booklet. Day 37 halfway lands Tuesday 10 November.
17 December 2026 – 3 January 2027
No tracker, no tiers, no rule. The Semi Sorted 73 booklet launches Boxing Day, so you can set up over the break and start fresh with everyone on 4 January.
2027 · four seasons, do them with me
Mon 4 Jan – Wed 17 Mar
The first community season. Halfway: Tue 9 Feb. Reset runs into the Easter holidays.
Sun 4 Apr – Tue 15 Jun
Halfway: Mon 10 May. Reset in the June/July holidays.
Sat 3 Jul – Mon 13 Sep
Halfway: Sun 8 Aug. Reset in the September/October holidays.
Fri 1 Oct – Sun 12 Dec
Halfway: Sat 6 Nov. Then the Wind Down, 13 December to 2 January.
Resets follow the Queensland school holidays. Outside Queensland or the southern hemisphere? Same dates, just swap the weather, or pick your own Day 1 below.
Make it your own
Build your own season
You don't need my dates. Pick your Day 1, map your season, and put the dates on a calendar you'll actually look at. Or join me for Season 4 on Monday 5 October.
Free printable, no sign-up
The season pages
One page per season, five seasons in each file: Season 4 of 2026 plus all four seasons of 2027. Every day has four pillar tick boxes and a day type to circle, plus week XP, the level ladder, your four Grace Cards and the pamper pot on the same page.
The Queensland edition marks Qld public holidays and school terms. The anywhere edition is the same pages with no holidays, and a blank key dates box for your own. A3 for the wall, A4 for your planner.
It's a challenge, not a funnel, so these are straight downloads. Print yours, stick it up, tick the boxes with whatever pen is closest.
Done dabbling
Follow the season as it happens
I'm doing my own Semi Sorted 73 right alongside you and documenting the whole thing, honest weekly check-ins included. The good days, the meh days, and the days ticked out of pure stubbornness.
Going through a patch that's bigger than a rhythm can fix? That's not a willpower problem. Here's where the real support lives.