Don’t Break a Habit – Remodel It – Part 2

This is a continuation of yesterday’s post with a more detailed discussion about changing habits.  All the information in this post is taken from The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. 

There is a neurological pathway that drives every habit which is depicted in the image below.

The more often you run through this cycle the more intense craving for the behavior becomes.  In order to change a habit you have to understand the forces that are driving it.  You will need to do some introspection and maybe some experimentation to determine what the cue and rewards are for your habit.

Discover the cue

Research on habits has shown that there are 5 things that most often trigger a habit:

1. Location
2. Time of day
3. Emotional state
4. Other people present
5. The immediately preceding action

So make a plan to do a little experiment whenever your habit is triggered.  Prepare a form on paper, Google Doc or whatever with the following questions:

Where am I?

What is the time of day?

What am I feeling  (emotional state)?

Who else is with me?

What was I doing?

Answer those questions each time your habit is triggered and keep a record of the responses.  After a few days you will begin to see a pattern.  Whichever of those questions has the same or a similar response every time – that is your cue.

Now you have to figure out what reward you are getting from the behavior.

Determining the reward

Think about your habit, what benefit are you getting from it?  It could be relieving stress, satisfying hunger, easing boredom.  If you aren’t sure, some experimentation is required.

First determine what the reward could be and write down your guesses.  Pick the most likely one and think of a way to replace the unwanted behavior with something different that will also provide the same reward.  For example if you think your reward is easing boredom and the unwanted behavior is going on youtube and watching videos, think of something else you can do to relieve your boredom.  You can go for a walk, switch to a different task, work on your novel, etc…

Make a plan, write down what alternative behavior you will try when you feel the cue begin to trigger your habit.  It is important to plan ahead and be aware of when the craving for your habit begins.  If you aren’t planning ahead it will be too easy to fall into your usual habitual behavior.

When you have successfully substituted a different behavior for your habitual one, set a timer for 15 minutes later, then go about your business as usual.  When the time goes off, assess how you are feeling, does your craving seem to be satisfied?  If your craving is still strong, the alternative behavior hasn’t satisfied you.  Make a plan to try a different behavior next time.

When you finally feel satisfied after the alternative behavior, you have found your reward and a possible replacement behavior.  Once again formulate a plan to replace your habit with your newly discovered alternative.  You will have to remain aware of your cue and your plan and make a conscious effort to change the behavior.  If you aren’t paying attention the old habit will play out as usual. 

You will have a few set-backs, especially when you are under stress or not paying attention, but don’t beat yourself up about it.  Set-backs are part of the process.  Eventually you find that a new, more sensible behavior is now your habit.

Today’s Action Item:  Form a plan to start the process of discovering the cue to your habit today. 

Don’t Break a Habit – Remodel It – Part 1

According to the latest research the best way to “break” a bad habit is not to try to stop doing the behavior completely, but instead change the behavior to something healthier or more productive.

I just finished reading The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg.  The book goes into detail about how habits are formed, operate and can be changed.  It also discusses how businesses can change habits of their customers and employees.

A Habit is a 3-step process

Here’s what the research shows:  a habit is a process, not just the behavior itself.

1)     A cue (feeling, sight, smell, sound) that sets the habit in motion

2)    The routine – the habitual behavior

3)    The reward – the benefit you get from the behavior, this is what maintains the habit

The key to changing a habit is identifying the reward.  What is that behavior doing for you?  Is it relieving stress, satisfying hunger, easing boredom?  Once you understand what the behavior is doing for you, you can begin to replace the behavior with something healthier or more productive.

An example from my own life:  Ages ago I was a binge eater and I was starting to get into the purging behavior that often goes with it.  I hated that I was doing this so I was greatly motivated to change the behavior, which does help.  But I started to notice that I would spend the day thinking about what I was going to eat that evening, not about what I was going to do that evening.  After a lot of introspection I realized that I was eating out of boredom, so I made a point of keeping myself busy every evening.  Gradually the binging behavior subsided.  It still does occasionally return when I am really bored, but because I am now aware of the behavior and what caused it I can often redirect my behavior to something more productive.

More detail is coming in part 2 of this topic about how to identify the cues and rewards that are driving your habit.

Today’s Action Item:  What habit do you want to change?  Start thinking about what cue triggers that habit and what reward you get from it.  Be ready to start experimenting with it after you read Part 2 tomorrow.

More Thoughts on Motivation

Apparently I’m motivated to write about motivation these days.  To continue what I started discussing in “But don’t want to!” and “Pump up your passion”, there are many more ways to motivate yourself into action.  Everyone is different and some people will respond better to one technique than another, so try what sounds good to you, but if it doesn't work, something else might.

Motivating techniques

1) Make it a game. What can you do to make your task fun?  Is there a way you can turn it into a game?  How fast can you do it?  How many different ways can you devise to get the job done?

2) Physical activity.  Sometimes all you need to do is get up out of your chair and move.  A quick walk or some yoga will get your blood flowing.  Newton’s first law of motion applies to people as well as inanimate objects:  A body at rest tends to stay at rest; and a body in motion tends to stay in motion.

3) Music.  Listening to the right kind of music for what you need to do can give you a motivating boost.  Dance music can get you moving.  A song that inspires you can give you confidence.  Soothing music can help you concentrate, or calm down if you are nervous about what you need to do.

4) Get creative.  Can you be creative about how you complete your task?  An example from my life:  I was often bored while writing my thesis because it had to be written in such dry, academic language.  So just to get myself to start writing, I’d write a section in everyday language, inserting jokes, puns and saying whatever I wanted to say.  Of course I’d have to edit it back to the dry boring language afterward, but the technique got me writing.

5) Self-hypnosis/Visualization.  I will be writing a long post on how to do self-hypnosis but until then you can use a visualization technique.  Visualize yourself doing whatever you are trying to motivate yourself to do, while also imagining that you are having fun doing it and successfully completing the task.  If you get good at visualizing while feeling positive emotions associated with the task, it can be a very effective motivational technique.  

And if none of that works

Can you pay someone to do it?  If it’s something really mundane, maybe paying someone to do it is the way to go.  There are websites which allow you to sell your services or pay someone else to do things, like fiverr.com, or craigslist.  Maybe you can barter with a family member or friend to exchange services.

Today’s Action Item:  Get creative, what other ways can you think of to motivate yourself?  Try one of these techniques and see what works.

Pump up your Passion

One way to get yourself to take action is to fire up your passion, excitement and desire for your goal.  Being passionate is enough motivation in most cases to inspire you to action.

Get in touch with your passion

Think about your goal and all that you will gain from achieving it.  Feel what it will feel like when you have achieved it. 

If you aren’t already passionate about your goal, maybe you need to reconsider the goal.  Is it something you really want or do you want it because you feel it is something you are supposed to want?  Are you being pushed by others toward this goal?  Did you chose the goal because you thought it was all you could hope to achieve?  Maybe you need to pick a more exciting goal.

How do you fire up your passion?

Maybe you need to motivate yourself to take a step toward your goal.  You have passion for the goal, but some steps on the way are pretty mundane.  For instance, you need to pass a class to graduate.  Graduation is an important step toward your goal, but the class you need is not interesting to you.

If that is the case, get passionate instead about the benefit that reaching the goal will give you.  Get excited about the financial benefit of the job or the furtherance of your career.  Think beyond the goal to the happiness you will experience after you have reached it. Each achievement is a stepping stone to a better life.  Imagine how your situation will improve and how much closer you are to your ultimate goal.  It only gets easier as you move through each step along your journey.  With each achievement, no matter how small, you gain the experience of success.  You gain confidence that you can do the same or take on an even bigger challenge the next time.  Taking action gets easier each time you do it.

Action Item: Watch a motivational video.  Then take action on something you have been putting off.