Self-help culture clings to the fiction of the day rule, presum—ably, because it makes habit change sound plausibly difficult enough, but basically easy.
The first problem with this is dispiritingly simple: changing habits is hard. The subtler problem is that we tend to think about habit change wrongly. I'm not talking about physiological addictions. We're mired deep in what the Greeks called "akrasia": deciding on the best course of action, then doing something else.
There's no shortage of apps out there designed to help you form a habit, and many of those are built on the assumption that all you need is 21 days.
This number comes from a widely popular book called Psycho-Cybernetics by Maxwell Maltz, a plastic surgeon who noticed his patients seemed to take about 21 days to get used to their new faces. However, according to a study , the time it takes to form a habit really isn't that clear-cut. Without the normal external cues set by your standard everyday surroundings, the new behavior may stick more quickly.
It can help to have internal motivation, like a strong desire for self-improvement, rather than external motivation, like other people telling you your new habit is a good idea.
Telling your friends and family about your plan for your new habit, however, is a must. They can help hold you accountable. Some neuroscientists claim that it is easier to start doing something new than it is to stop doing something that's already a habit. But if you're looking to end a current bad habit, it can help to replace it with a new habit rather than leaving an empty hole where your bad habit once was.
Start running 10 miles a day starting tomorrow even though you're not an avid runner? Probably not going to happen. Cook a healthy dinner at home one more night per week? You can do that. At least one study showed that when trying for a new habit, making a resolution makes you ten times more likely to be successful. So go ahead—state your intentions and put your brain to work. Please note that archive episodes of this podcast may include references to Ask Science.
Represented exclusively by Greenlight. For instance, if your goal is to eat more vegetables, you can reach that goal without giving up your nightly post-dinner ice cream binge.
In cases such as these, you need to think about the ultimate goal that your new habit is feeding into and adjust your lifestyle an appropriate amount in order to make sure your new habit makes a relevant difference in your life. However, the study found that this is not the case.
This is huge news for those who believe that missing just one day means all of your progress has gone to waste. It simply requires your best and most consistent attempt over an extended period of time. And, to keep up your best work, you need to have a sense of intrinsic motivation to actually start engaging in the behavior. You have to enjoy the process of getting to your goal rather than just thinking about that final moment when your goal is achieved.
Obviously, the beginning of your journey to forming a new habit is going to be more challenging than the weeks to come.
Your new behavior will become more automatic as time goes on, no matter what it is. But, staying motivated requires you to know your motive for making a change in the first place. Asking yourself these questions will help you identify the reasons that you want to make some kind of change in your life and keep you feeling inspired to do so. Allowing yourself to trust the process and recognize when you meet smaller milestones will help you see your ultimate habit formation as being more attainable.
Understanding the process of habit formation and the amount of time it takes to succeed will set you up for success. There is no shame in taking longer than three months to form a habit, or even four or five months.
A large part of your success in establishing new habits will depend upon your ability to exercise your best efforts, keep track of your progress, and make adjustments accordingly.
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