Forming Good Habits

Welcome Back!

In this post, I will be talking about the art of forming good habits.

Certain stimuli can trigger habitual behaviour. Once you understand that, you can use this knowledge to change your habits.

Encourage better habits by changing your environment. Make your cues as obvious as possible. You will be more likely to respond to them. If you want to eat healthier, start by putting healthy snack on the table instead of putting them into the closet.
Use intentions that are implementable. Don’t be like, “I will eat better”. Instead, create a proper plan of action and set out when and where you will cultivate your habits.
Build temptations. Start with the end goal in your mind and what you will get from it. Humans are always motivated by the anticipation of the reward. Our brain not only releases dopamine (the feel-good hormone) when we do things that we love, but also when we anticipate them.
Making habits attractive will make you stick to them. Link the habit with a behaviour that you’re drawn to. For example, allow yourself to watch episodes of your favorite show while you are cycling at the gym.
Make the habit as easy as to adopt as possible. Reduce friction for good habits, increase friction for bad habits.
Use the 2 minute rule. Make any new activity feel manageable by only committing 2 minutes to it. This way, you can build easy achievable habits, and those can lead you on to greater things. Simply getting started is the most important step!
Make habits immediately satisfying. When you’re pursuing habits that are not immediately satisfying, you will lose your interest and will not continue the habit.
Lastly, commit yourself to making a habit and never ever give up. Giving up may seem the easy way. However, not giving up is the very secret behind making a good and successful habit.

Thought of the Day:

“If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude.”

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This post is based on James Clear's book "Atomic Habits".

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See you in the subsequent post!