HOW GOOD HABITS CREATE A GREAT LIFE

If you find yourself making grand proclamations about how you are going to change your life, by adopting a new way of living, we hear you. But does it work? Do your new habits stick?

We are all familiar with New Year Resolutions and how easily we promise ourselves to be healthier, exercise more, leave work on time, take up that hobby, learn a new language. We believe we can do it this time.

And, yet, by the second Tuesday in January, more often than not we're sitting on the sofa with a glass of wine, wondering why we bought the gym membership.

Why do we fail so often in our bid to achieve our goals? Logically we know being healthier and fitter will make us feel better. But, it doesn't make going to the gym or reaching for an apple rather than the apple cake any easier.

So, what are the secrets to sticking with good habits and ditching the bad habits? This is where knowing the psychology of human behaviour (including your own) helps. In his book 'Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build GOod Habits and Break Bad Ones', James Clear goes into some detail about the way our brains work and how this translates into keeping up new habits, or not.

The book is excellent and worth the in depth read. For brevity, here are a four insights which can help you get on track with living our life the way you want it to.

If you want to build up positive habits, find ways to:

1. Make it obvious.

  • If all your healthy food is in the cupboard, and the sweets are out on the side, guess what? You're going to reach for the sweets and forget about the fruit. In sticking with a habit, environment matters more than motivation.
  • Why? Because context triggers our behaviour. Here, the secret to doing more of something is to have it in sight.
  • For instance. If you want to drink more water, where is your water bottle? Similarly, if you want to do less of something, make it invisible. E.g. if you want to spend less time on your phone, put it away out of sight.  

2. Make it attractive.

  • We humans are simple creatures and we like to feel good. The reason we love tasty food is the pleasurable hit of dopamine we get. We learn that certain foods and activities give us pleasure and it's the anticipation of this reward that makes us take action.
  • Which means you can trick yourself into adopting healthy habits by linking them to feel-good activities.
  • The secret is to reward yourself with the thing you crave AFTER you've done the thing you want to do.
  • For instance, I'll watch that movie AFTER I've been for a run. I'll have a bubble bath AFTER I've cooked a healthy dinner. Treat yourself and you'll adopt good habits more often.  

3. Make it easy.

  • We often get told it takes 28*, 30*, 60* days to form a habit [*different studies show varying days]. James Clear suggests we stop thinking about the TIME it takes to form a habit and start thinking about FREQUENCY.
  • Ask yourself 'How many times do I need to do this to form a habit?' The more times you do something, the more likely you are to form a habit.
  • The secret to repeated action is to make the habit as easy as possible to do. Remove resistance (or if you want to stop a 'bad' habit, make it really hard).
  • For instance. Want to save more? Set up a direct debit on payday. Want to wake up earlier? Leave your curtains open and let the sunshine in [unless you live in Scotland in the winter - because you'll be getting up at 10am!] Want to spend less time on social media? Delete the apps and/or turn off your phone at 7pm.

4. Make it satisfying.

  • Our human brain love instant gratification and that's a problem. It means we prioritise what makes us feel good right now, and neglect habits which are good in the long run.
  • Take alcohol and junk food. They taste really good in the moment, but if you enjoy them daily - you won't feel good after a year.
  • The secret to tricking the brain into sticking with the (long-term reward) good habits is to create an instant association with a long-term goal.
  • For instance, every time you exercise, you put aside money towards a future reward e.g. a holiday or new mountain bike.

There are many more lessons to take from James Clear's book. We will explore these with different art works. For now, have another read through this list and reflect on how you can help yourself adopt more good habits and ditch ones you don't want in your life so much.

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