Knowing this makes habit change easier
You’ve got a habit, one that you no longer want.
Logically you know it’s detracting from your heath and logically you know what you need to do instead.
Despite what you know to do and how much you want to change, you still have a hard time following through.
Willpower, control, and negative motivation work…for a while…and then you’re back to happy hours instead of the gym or cake instead of quinoa.
What gives? Here’s two reasons why changing a habit is challenging:
1. You get a twisted benefit from the habit
You have linked a subconscious ‘benefit’ to your habit and of course, it’s not really a benefit at all. A smoker may subconsciously associate calmness with their habit (and ironically smoking is a stimulant.)
Alcohol is often associated with stress relief or as a way to ‘check out’ from feeling and thinking.
2. Your brain loves automation
Your brain loves habits and doesn’t give one shit what the habit is as long as it can automate it and save energy. Our brains love the path of least resistance.
Here’s what you need to know and do to make habit change easy:
1. Leave logic behind
95% of what you do every day is not based on logic! Yes, 95%! The larger part of your mind ‘thinks’ and takes corresponding actions based on associations, sensory experiences, and repetition.
Here’s a quick test: Think about your average day — how many habits do you practice that you logically know aren’t in your best interest?
2. Create a new and strong association and experience that mimics the same ‘benefit’ you were getting with the old habit
Here's a drinking example...
You want to stop or cut back on drinking and you currently associate drinking with stress relief. Start associating a new habit with stress relief and start experiencing it with an open mind (vs trying hard, using negative motivation, and willpower.)
Make the new association vivid and enticing — so enticing that you’re compelled to keep practicing the new habit because you feel so much more vibrant, clear, and calm when you do it.
Maybe you decide to start taking walks for 5 pm happy hour instead of opening a bottle of wine. And to help strengthen this new pattern, start making a strong association that links walks with stress relief.
Focus on all the real benefits you get from this new association.
How does it make you feel to be out walking in nature? What benefits do you get from listening to the birds? How do you feel when you take in a deep breath of fresh air? How much more energy and stamina are you gaining with this new pattern? How much better will you feel in the morning and how soundly will you sleep?
What other benefits can you imagine? Attitude? Happiness? Clarity? A shift in self-confidence? Weight loss? Hydrated skin? Keep associating these numerous real benefits with walks.
Repeat. Repeat. Repeat
You’ve probably heard that it takes 21-60ish days to form a new habit which, in the big scheme of things, isn’t long at all.
Remember, your brain could care less if it helps you walk on a regular basis or drink, it just knows to take the easiest and most automated path.
When you keep repeating your new habit daily your brain begins to form a new automated path of least resistance that feels easy to sustain (just like how drinking became easy to sustain when repeated enough times.)
The good news with this approach to habit change? You bypass logic, trying hard, negative motivation, and willpower.
And that is how habit change is done and you, my friend, have the power to do it with more ease.
How’s your relationship with food? Fitness? Your body? If you said complicated, stressful, and energy draining, you’re not alone.
How would you like these relationships to be? Easy and peaceful? Joyful?
Consider MindBodyNOW. It could be the class you never knew you always needed. Class is forming now.
