Why is it so easy to repeat bad habits and so difficult to build good habits. We find it difficult to get good habits going for a few days despite our sincere efforts and bursts of motivation.
Once our habits are established, they seem to stick around forever; particularly the bad ones. Unhealthy habits like eating junk food, binge-watching, procrastination can feel impossible to break.
There are 2 reasons why this happens
1. We try to change the wrong thing
2. We try to change our habits in the wrong way.
Good habits are the compound interest of self-improvement. They seem to make little difference on any given day, but the impact they deliver over days, months, and years can be enormous.
If you are overweight and you go to the gym for 10 days, still you are out of shape. We make a few changes, but the results never seem to come quickly, and we slide back into our previous routines.
Outcomes are a lagging measure of our habits. Our net worth is a lagging measure of our Financial habits. Our weight is a lagging measure of our eating habits. Our knowledge is a lagging measure of our learning habits. We get what we repeat.
Outcome Vs Identity
Many of us begin the process of changing our habits by focusing on what we want to achieve. This is outcome-based habits. In Identity-based, we focus on who we wish to become.
Imagine this scenario. You are trying to quit drinking. Now, you are invited to an office party, and you were offered drinks. If you say,” Sorry, I am trying to quit drinking”. This looks like a perfectly good response for someone who is trying to quit drinking. But the problem here is, you still think yourselves as a person who drinks, and you are trying to be something else.
Let’s say if you respond by saying, “No thanks, I don’t drink”. Here, you are identifying yourselves as a person who doesn’t have the habit of drinking. Drinking is part of your past life, not your current life. You don’t identify yourselves as someone who drinks.
The more pride you have about a particular aspect of your identity, the more motivated you will be to maintain the habits associated with it. If you love your hair, you will develop all sorts of habits to care for and maintain it. If you love your physique, you make sure that you hit the gym regularly. Once your pride is involved you will do anything and everything to maintain those habits.
You might start a habit because of motivation, but you will keep doing it once it becomes part of your identity.
The goal is not to run a marathon; the goal is to become a runner
The goal is not to read a book; the goal is to become a reader.
The question is, how can we change our identity?
For the longest time, I want to practice Yoga daily. I first attended a yoga class in December 2013 when I was doing my MBA in Bangalore. I was going through an awful phase at that time. I thought practicing yoga would help me. It did to some extent. But the problem was I couldn’t do it daily. Its been the case for the last 6 years. Out of motivation, I will do it for a few days and again I fall back to my older routines. When I look back, I realized I approached it based on outcome rather on my identity. What I wanted was to be a healthy person; Yoga was a means to achieve it. But what I did was focused on my goal of doing yoga.
Forget about the goal; focus on the system
Whenever I wanted to start a new habit, this is what I tell myself; I will start doing it tomorrow, come what may. The next day morning, I tell myself, I will do it in the evening. Finally, I end up doing nothing and this happens every day. Though my intentions are good, I never got around making any progress. I was trying to start a new habit without making a specific plan of when and where I am going to do it. I just hoped that “I would just remember to do it”
Instead of saying “I am going to start doing yoga tomorrow”
Be specific like “I will practice Yoga daily for 30 mins at 8 AM in my room”.
This gives clarity of, when I am going to do it and where I am going to do it, and how much time I am going to do it. This is a more concrete action plan.
I have started practicing this from 23-March-2020 and it’s been almost 6 months and I am yet to miss a session of Yoga. It’s become an integral part of my daily life now. Wish I learned this hack 6 years back.
How to Hold Yourself Accountable
“A habit contract is a verbal contract in which you state your commitment to a particular habit and the punishment that will occur if you don’t follow through. Then you one of your friends/family to act as an accountability partner for this contract”
When I first read about this, I felt this seemed too serious and am not sure about it. I thought about it for quite some time and decided to give it a try.
I always wanted to build the habit of writing regularly. So, I decided to enter a habit contract with one of my friends and my college junior, Kiran.
So, this is how it goes,
I should be publishing an article in Medium every week until the end of this year. Failing to do so, I will pay Kiran Rs.1000 at the end of the week. Kiran will hold me accountable by reminding me about my contract every week. I have started 2 weeks back, so far it seems to be working 😊
An accountability partner can create an immediate cost to inaction. Knowing that someone else is watching us can be a powerful motivator.
Can one tiny change transform our life? It’s unlikely. But what if we made another? And another? And another? At some point, we will have to admit that our life was transformed by one small change.
Success is not a goal to reach or a finish line to cross. It’s a system to improve, an endless process to refine. If you’re having trouble changing your habits, the problem isn’t you. It's your system.
Small habits don’t add up. They compound. That’s the power of atomic habits. Tiny changes. Remarkable Results.
