Welcome back people! Today we will be discussing further about Habits. In the last post, we talked about the importance of habits and how they affect our lifestyle. Lets discuss a few methods to practice good habits in a better way and gradually eliminate the bad ones.

^{Habit is the intersection of knowledge (what to do), skill (how to do), and desire (want to do).}

Steven .R. Covey

Some simple methods to build Good Habits

I have read multiple books which have helped me learn and implement ways to use this power of habit. I’ll share some of my methods with you for you to try out! Make sure you implement them in your daily activities and you’ll start noticing the changes yourself.

1. Regularity: The most important thing that makes a habit a habit, is it’s Regularity. Behaviors turn into Habits when they are repeated regularly. Hence it is very important to maintain the regularity when trying to develop a habit. The points below will make it easier for you to maintain it.
2. Values and Identity: We have discussed about Values in one of our previous blogs. Why am I bringing that up here? Some of our habits are closely related to our Values too. After you have done a Self Assessment, you can be sure about your true values. Compare them to your Habits. Are your Habits in sync with your Values? Or are they opposing them? For example, one of your values may be Honesty, but you have the habit of exaggerating or overselling things when you’re talking to people. In this case, reflect on what is actually true for you? Your habit or your Value? Habits work the best when they are in sync with your values. So one of the things has to change in this example.
3. Process Oriented: People always start trying to develop a habit with some goal in mind. That can be weight loss, better immunity, knowledge of current affairs, better social relations, anything literally. As crazy as it sounds, these big goals distract us from the process. We become so obsessive about our goals, that we forget to concentrate on the process that leads to them. It is important to dream big, but the focus has to be on the process. How can I be more energetic during my workouts? How can I change my diet so that it’s healthier? How can I motivate myself to read one more page of the newspaper? How can I start being more active in social groups? Focus on the process helps us to be more aware of the mistakes we make and the learnings we get from them. Small improvements in the process act as big steps towards your goal. So rather than being obsessed about the Goal, enjoy the Process.
4. Routine: Setting up a routine for yourself becomes very important whenever you’re trying to improve your lifestyle. I know it sounds very boring to follow a specific timetable everyday but it actually makes more sense than you think. Think about it, how much time do you waste throughout the day thinking about what to do next? Can it be saved if you have your activities planned out for the day? Even if you don’t make a strict timetable for the day, you can just make list of things you want to do today. You can slowly cross things off that list one at a time. When you do this, you give a good direction to your day, and actually end up saving more time than usual. Use this time to try out the new things you want to do or the new habits you want to develop. Be creative.
5. Time/Place: After you get used to having to-do lists everyday, it will be time to take the next step. To develop good habits, you can choose a specific time or place to do them. For example, I will read in the evening. I will complete my work/studies in the morning. I will eat at the dining table and not on the bed. Why does this help? When you allot a specific time to your habit, it makes it easier for your mind to remember and execute it. It associates evenings with reading, or work with morning. After doing it regularly, you won’t be able to miss it as your day will feel incomplete without it. When your mind allots a space to the habit, that room/environment becomes a motivation for doing the habit. Every time you go there, the mind will remind you to do the habit. And doing the habit elsewhere won’t feel the same.
6. Association: If you want to incorporate a new habit in your lifestyle, an easy method is to associate it with some habit that you do regularly without fail. For example, if you want to develop the habit of reading a newspaper, you can associate it with your daily morning habit, which will be drinking tea/coffee. So you can decide that you’ll read at least a page of the newspaper while/before/after having your morning beverage. Once you regularize this, your coffee will start acting as a motivation to read. This can be an effective method to develop habits.
7. Start Small: Like we discussed, the focus has to be on the Process. Set aside the goal for a moment. Think about something that will make doing the habit easy for you. For example, your Goal is to have a well toned body. But keep that aside. What’s the process required for it? A good workout routine. Say doing Pushups is a part of the routine. But as you might’ve experienced before it will be okay when you do 50 pushups for the first 3-4 days of your workout. But after that it starts to become difficult to maintain the routine. What should be done then? Our mind is very lazy. This laziness becomes a roadblock especially in such cases. But like we discussed before, it becomes easy to do things if a particular routine is followed. So I suggest in this case, start with something that is very easy. Say like 5 pushups everyday. Now this may sound crazy, but it’ll actually help you. It is very easy to do these 5 pushups everyday as it doesn’t require much effort and you can maintain the regularity. Once your body gets used to the routine, slowly increase the number of pushups you do. By the time you reach your 50 pushups goal, it will be very easy to maintain the regularity.
8. Motivation: It becomes extremely important to stay motivated while developing a new habit. Like all good things, developing new habits takes time and efforts. But if you do it the smart way you can make the process easier and more fun. To stay motivated, you can associate rewards with your habit. Take something from your day which feels rewarding to you. For example, watching TV. In that case, decide that you get to watch TV only after you finish doing the new habit you’re trying to develop. This way, doing your habit feels more rewarding.
9. Track your Progress: Another way of Motivating yourself is by tracking your record of doing your habits on a regular basis. For example, if you are developing the habit of going for a run everyday, get a calendar and mark every day you went for a run. Place this calendar where you spend most of your time; your kitchen, workspace, study table etc. For this particular habit, you can even try to check your weight at the end of each month and write it on your calendar. When you see the progress you’re making everyday, it’ll act as an instant motivation for you to get up and go for a run.
10. Design your Environment: According to Psychologists, your environment plays a huge role in the development of your habits. We discussed about setting a specific place for each habit. When that place has been decided, you can design it in such a way that it motivates or inspires you to do that habit. Readers can place their books on their tables or shelves, Fitness Freaks can keep their workout equipment where they can see it, Painters can put up paintings of their favorite artist on their walls etc.

Conclusion

As we discussed, our mind is very lazy. These tricks will help you to overcome it’s laziness and do things that you’ve always wanted to do. Tiny habits can bring about a huge change in your life. They will make you a better person and help you lead your life more efficiently.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.

Will Durant

I hope you had fun reading this! Next week we will be concluding our journey of Self Discovery. But don’t worry we have new things lined up after that! So I hope you put these things into practice and see the desired changes in your life! See you soon!

Love, Ninad.