Hey there!
Are you fed up with constantly falling short of your goals? Do you want to make lasting improvements in your life? If so, this article is for you! We’ll be exploring how small, consistent habits can lead to significant progress and how to start building these habits for yourself. So come along with us and let’s start creating some atomic habits today!
About James Clear
James Clear has been researching habits and decision-making for many years. Today, his newsletter has over one million subscribers. His first book, Atomic Habits, has sold millions of copies and has been translated into more than 50 languages.
Introduction
Rather than focusing on big goals, it’s more effective to develop habits through consistent, repetitive actions and systems. This can help ensure that the habits stick.
Small habits are more important for making significant life changes than drastic ones. For example, improving your diet, exercise, and sleep habits can help you get in shape. It’s better to make consistent small changes every day than to set unrealistic goals. The quality of your life depends on your habits, and even small ones can make a big difference in the long run.
The Basics– Why Tiny Changes Make a Big Difference
What Are Habits?
Habits are automatic behaviors that we repeat every day without much thought. These habits can be powerful because they shape our identity through the actions we take daily. Even the smallest habits can have a significant impact.
Be patient when trying to make positive changes, as they may take time to manifest. However, practicing good habits can help you stay on track and achieve your goals, even if you don’t see immediate results. You don’t have to make major disruptions to make significant changes in your life through habits; sometimes, small adjustments to your behavior are enough to produce the desired outcomes.
Why is it difficult to develop good habits?
Conditioning
Habits are created by repeating behaviors that give us satisfying results. For example, a baby sucking their thumb to calm down will repeat the behavior because it feels calming. It can be difficult to break bad habits and replace them with good ones, but we can use conditioning to develop good habits by doing activities that give us satisfaction, like a morning run that makes us feel energized and productive.
Minor Improvements
Small improvements like a daily morning run can add up over time and have a significant impact. Incremental changes can have a big impact, such as improving 1% daily resulting in being 37 times better by the same time next year. Small everyday improvements can become atomic habits that help you reach your goals. However, bad habits can also have a big impact, such as getting 1% worse each day resulting in a significant decline over a year.
Compound Interest
Atomic habits, or small consistent actions, are like compound interest for self-improvement. The impact of your habits multiplies as you repeat them, similar to how money grows over time through compound interest. However, the effects of your habits may not be noticeable day-to-day but can be significant in the long term. Cultivate good habits with a compounding effect, but be aware that bad habits can also compound and have negative consequences.
Success is the result of daily habits, not one-time major changes. It’s normal to not see immediate results from your habits, as outcomes tend to lag behind the habits that produce them. You may not see the difference until you reach a certain threshold, called the plateau of latent potential, and unlock a new level of performance.
Forget About Goals, Concentrate on Systems
Goals are the results you want to achieve and systems are the processes that lead to those outcomes. Your focus should be on the systems, as they manage goals. Winners and losers often have the same goals, but it’s the systems and habits that winners use that help them achieve success and get results. Achieving a goal only brings temporary change and can limit your happiness. Goals don’t lead to long-term progress, but systems do. If you’re struggling to change your habits, it’s not because of a personal flaw, but rather because of your approach or system. Instead of focusing on specific goals, try to focus on the overall system that will help you achieve your desired outcomes. Don’t rise to the level of your goals, instead, fall back on the level of your system. It’s all about the system, not goals.
Habit Loops
Habits are self-reinforcing. This means that doing the habit and receiving the reward strengthens your desire to do it again. You can use this to your advantage when you want to change your behavior. There is a clear step-by-step process that actions travel through to become a habit:
1. The cue triggers your brain to initiate a behavior because it predicts a reward.
2. After receiving this initial reward, you will start to develop cravings. You are not craving the habit itself but the internal change it delivered.
3. Based on these cravings, this behavior becomes part of your identity and becomes a habit you perform in your life.
4. Finally, this habitual behavior starts to deliver long-term rewards.
Let’s take a look at the example of morning coffee in the formation of a habit loop:
· Cue = waking up
· Craving = feeling alert
· Action = drinking coffee
· Reward = feeling alert
The four steps of the habit loop combine to form a neurological feedback loop. This loop is:
cue –> craving –> response –> reward
Ultimately, this loop allows you to create and reinforce automatic habits. The more you practice this habit loop with any particular habit, the more it will become automatic. Clear provides four laws that describe the way you can start building habit loops.
1st Law — Make It Obvious
To build good habits using habit loops, make the cues (triggers) for those habits obvious. To break bad habits, make the cues for those habits less noticeable or remove them. For example, put a guitar in a prominent place as a reminder to practice or create a habit stack, linking a new habit to an established one. Your brain forms strong connections for regular habits, which you can use to establish new habits.
How to Form Good Habits
Certain stimuli can trigger habitual behavior. Once you understand that, you can use this knowledge to form good habits.
1. To encourage good habits, try changing your environment to create more noticeable cues. For example, if you want to eat healthier snacks, leave them in a visible place rather than hiding them in a drawer.
2. To establish a new habit, create a specific plan for when and where you will perform the behavior. This is called an implementation intention. Instead of making a general statement like “I will eat better,” make a concrete plan for when and where you will make healthier eating choices.
3. To help stick to new habits, link them to something enjoyable to motivate you. This activates the production of dopamine, a hormone that helps you feel good. For example, watch your favorite show while exercising on the bike to make the new habit more attractive and increase your chances of sticking with it.
4. Make the habit as easy to adopt as possible. Reduce friction for good habits and increase friction for bad habits.
5. Use the two-minute rule. Make any new activity feel manageable by only committing to two minutes of it. This is a way to build easily achievable habits, leading you to more extraordinary achievements. Getting started is the most critical step.
6. Establish immediately satisfying habits. When you’re pursuing habits with a delayed return, try to attach immediate gratification to them. For example, if you work out, learn to like the feeling of that pump you get after exercise.
How to Keep Your Habits on Track
Option 1: Habit Tracker
Habit trackers help you keep track of daily behaviors you need to maintain to establish a new habit. Use a calendar or diary to create a habit tracker and mark each day that you follow the habit. Habit tracking can be a satisfying and rewarding activity, which helps you stick to new habits.
Option 2: Contract
To hold yourself accountable to new habits, create a contract with negative consequences if you don’t follow through. Involving others in the contract can also be helpful, as the knowledge that someone is watching can motivate you to maintain the habits.
2nd Law — Make It Attractive
To make a habit stick, get regular positive feedback from it. Temptation bundling, or linking an enjoyable activity with an unenjoyable one, can help. Joining a culture where the habit is normalized can also make it more attractive. To break a bad habit, leave cultures where it is accepted and join ones where it is not. For example, quit smoking by spending less time with people who smoke regularly.
3rd Law — Make It Easy
Traditionally, motivation is thought to be key to changing habits. However, the relationship between motivation and habit change is more complex. People prefer the option that requires the least effort, so use this to your advantage by making positive behaviors easy. For example, join a gym that’s on your way to work and prepare your gym bag the night before. To break unhealthy habits, increase the friction or effort required to engage in the behavior. For example, only turn on the TV when you can name the specific program you want to watch to reduce TV consumption.
4th Law — Make It Satisfying
New habits often don’t provide immediate results, making it difficult to stick to them. To overcome this, try to find ways to give yourself immediate rewards for your new habits. For example, if you’re trying to quit alcohol, set up a loyalty system where you transfer money to a holiday savings account every week you go without drinking. This provides immediate satisfaction and makes it easier to maintain the new habit.
Advanced Tactics
The Three Layers of Behavior Change
There are three layers to behavior change: outcomes, processes, and identity. Outcomes are the results of actions, processes are the steps to achieve those results, and identity is underlying beliefs. People often focus on outcomes and processes, but it’s hard to sustain new habits if you don’t change your identity. Every action is a vote for the type of person you want to become, and over time, positive actions can build evidence of a new identity.
Here’s a simple two-step process for change:
1. Be the type of person you want to be.
2. Prove your identity to yourself with little wins and small atomic habits.
Summary
Atomic Habits challenges the view that setting multiple goals is the key to success. Instead, James Clear recommends developing systems that help you create habits that will increase your chances of success. The simplest system to implement is one that helps you get 1% better every day.
You can get 1% better by:
Ø Breaking your bad habits and sticking to good ones.
Ø Avoiding the common mistakes most people make when changing habits.
Ø Overcoming a lack of motivation and willpower.
Ø Developing a stronger identity and believing in yourself.
Ø Making time for new habits.
Ø Designing your environment to make success easier.
Ø Making tiny, easy changes that deliver big results.
Ø Getting back on track when you get off course.
Ø Learning how to put these ideas into practice in real life.
On top of this, you can start building habit loops by adopting Clear’s four laws:
1. Make It Obvious
2. Make It Attractive
3. Make It Easy
4. Make It Satisfying
I hope you found the tips useful and that they help you become your most efficient version. If you’re interested in a more in-depth exploration of the topic, I recommend checking out the book for a more complete read!
(Note that this article contains affiliate links and offers; if you purchase any of the offers I may receive a commission)