For a long time, I associated habits with hobbies. Whenever I started a new hobby (a group course in the gym, a language course), I created a new habit, a routine that I would follow every week and act like guiding posts to my busy schedule. Although I might indeed have developed a habit, I was far from realising that habits have implications in our everyday life instead of surfacing once or twice a week. If you think, ‘what much more can there be behind establishing a habit?’ believe me when I say I had the same doubt before reading ‚Atomic Habits‘ by author James Clear.
Habits are not decisions. But repetitions.
Stop procrastination
It turns out habits are actions that can lead us to the person we want to be. And to establish and keep a habit, we have to identify with the kind of person that would perform this habit. For example, ‚I want to lose weight‘ translates to ‚I want to be a healthy person‘ for it to stick. Leading with the belief and the identification and not with the action is the first step of establishing successful habits. Another example is ‚I want to write one blog post a week‘ requires the underlying mentality to change to ‚I am a writer. Consequently, identifying yourself as a writer will lead to what writers actually do, write that blog article that you have been procrastinating about the previous days. The change of ‚who‘ you are and identify with is essential in habit formation. As Clear explains, everything else is only temporary if not incorporated as a part of who you are.
Plan ahead
Planning is as trivial as an internal change of perception. I realised that as enjoyable as your new habit might or might not be, it will not come naturally to execute. Waiting for inspiration before performing acting is the main pitfall of habit creation. In Clear’s words, ‚Many people think they lack motivation when what they really lack is clarity. When your plan is too vague or not integrated into your daily planning, it is hard to materialise, let alone consistently keep it up. Excuses lure up in every corner of your day, making it hard to implement new routines.
Takeaways
In short, plan a time a day when you will let your new habit grow. It can be as short as 5 minutes a day to set up your new routine. Start small and build up later. Begin identifying yourself as the person you want to become. Work hard on the small things, and eventually, significant results will grow from the tiny seeds you plant. And finally, read ‚Atomic habits‘ to get inspired on your new journey. You got this.
Resources
- Atomic Habits, James clear. Amazon link
