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三日坊主 mikka bouzu
Quits everything by day three.
What does mikka bouzu mean?
Literally "three-day monk": someone who enters the temple on Monday and is gone by Wednesday. The gentlest way to admit your new habit didn't survive the week.
Example
ジムに通うって言ったのに、また三日坊主だった。
I said I'd go to the gym, and again I quit after three days.
Vibe
Who you can say this to, and how it lands.
Safe to use Fine in ordinary conversation.
The story behind mikka bouzu
The picture is specific: someone shaves their head, enters a temple, and is gone by Wednesday. It is not a joke about laziness so much as about miscalculation. Monastic training meant rising in the dark, cold water, plain food and long silences — a life that looks noble from outside and reveals itself very quickly from inside.
As a proverb it has aged beautifully, because the shape of the failure never changes. It is January and the gym is full; it is February and the gym is not. The diary with twelve blank months, the app whose streak died at four. Calling yourself 三日坊主 is an apology and a small act of self-forgiveness at once.
Get mikka bouzu in your pocket
三日坊主 is one of 308 words in YABAI, a Japanese culture snack for Android. Every word comes with its meaning, an example sentence, a vibe check and a story like the one above — in 13 languages, read aloud by your device. Paid app: no ads, no sign-up, no subscription.
