Do not confuse the metric for the real thing.

I used to feel that a long walk only counted if my phone recorded the steps. At some point I realised the point of walking was not to increase a number on a screen. I had confused the dopamine hit of completing a metric with the actual pleasure of going for a walk.

I would say that this applies to many things than just walking, and I could go on writing about this topic but I’m going to keep these notes deliberately short.