Tips on Breaking Bad Habits

[Daniel E.]

20 Tricks to Nuke a Bad Habit
by Scott Young
ZenHabits.net
July 5, 2007

Are you letting bad habits rule your life? I started learning how to change habits a few years ago. Since then I?ve switched to a vegan diet, began exercising every day, started writing new articles every day, began waking up earlier and trying some wacky experiments to improve my life. Here are some ideas I?ve found useful:

1. Commit for a Month. Thirty days is all you need to make a habit change permanent. Less time than that and the new alternative might not be hardwired into your brain. More time and any failures to last are usually a failure of strategy, not duration.
2. Replace What You Lose. Your habits fulfill needs. When you suddenly cause a change, you may inadvertently cut them out. Before you make a change, write down all the benefits you currently get from your bad habit and make sure they are retained going into the new habit.
3. Start Small. Changing habits isn?t a matter of willpower, but patience and strategy. Don?t expect to overhaul your diet, exercise or thinking patterns in a day. Tackle one habit at a time.
4. Know the Benefits. Get clear in your mind what the benefits are of making a change. If making a change rationally seems good but it doesn't feel good, it won?t stick. Emotions have more power than many of us realize.
5. Write it Down . Winston Churchill once said, ?Plans are useless, planning is invaluable.? Writing out any commitments you make will give you clarity both to what you desire and how you intend to do it.
6. Swish. A technique from NLP. Visualize yourself performing the bad habit. Next visualize yourself pushing aside the bad habit and performing an alternative. Finally, end that sequence with an image of yourself in a highly positive state. See yourself picking up the cigarette, see yourself putting it down and snapping your fingers, finally visualize yourself running and breathing free. Do it a few times until you automatically go through the pattern before executing the old habit.
7. Tell a Friend. Get some leverage on yourself. Tell a friend your plan so you will be more likely to commit to the change.
8. Make it an Experiment. Be a scientist. Just try the new habit to see what it will be like, rather than a great emotional struggle. This will help keep you focused on conditioning the trial and allow you to view results with less bias.
9. If at First You Don?t Succeed? Most big changes aren?t going to happen the first time. It took me three attempts before I finally stuck on with exercising regularly. Now I love it. Don?t be too hard on yourself if you fail the first time; just tweak your approach and go again.
10. Get Out of Hazard Zones. Get yourself out of situations that can trigger your old habit. Remove junk food from your house. Don?t go to places where you might break your budget. This isn?t always possible, but do your best to avoid temptation.
11. Use "But." A prominent habit-changing therapist once told me this great technique for changing bad thought patterns. When you start to think negative thoughts, use the word ?but? to interrupt it. ?I?m no good at this, but, if I work at it I might get better later.?
12. Know the Pain. Feel what will happen to you if you don't make a change. Use your imagination to enhance the image of your results should you do nothing.
13. Add Role Models. Start spending more time with people who live the way you want to live. Join groups and find mentors who have already adapted the habits you want to take on. They can be invaluable in giving you the positive reinforcement and guidance you need.
14. Stay Consistent. Try to keep as many aspects of your habit in control when conditioning to make the associations stronger. For the first month don?t just exercise a few times a week, but every day. Do things at the same time and in the same pattern to ensure your results stick.
15. Keep it Simple Stupid!. Habits should be one or two rules, not 20. If your plan looks like a User License Agreement from Microsoft, it?s probably too long. Keep changes simple so they will be easier to adhere to.
16. Remind Yourself. Put reminders of your habit around you. After spending a few years changing many habits, I?ve learned that one of the biggest ways I?ve failed is simply a poor memory. Forgetting to run a trial one day leads to two until your back where you started. Put up Post-It notes, affirmations or whatever you need to stay consistent.
17. Motivate Yourself. Get the motivation when things get tough. Check out 20 Motivation Hacks for some good ways to do that.
18. Break Down Your Goals. Use habits to get your goals. Break down your goal to be wealthy into habits of investing, frugality and entrepreneurship.
19. Don?t Strive for Perfection. Focus on the habits that are important and minimize those that aren?t. I?ve changed many major habits, but I've also learned to let minor problems exist if they distract me from the bigger picture.
20. Do it Now. Waiting for life? The best way to learn how to change those stubborn habits in your life is to practice. Make a change now and in a month you can have a completely new way of living.

Scott Young is a blogger at ScottHYoung.com, where he writes about productivity, motivation and getting the most out of life. This article is just an introduction ? for more, check out Scott?s latest book - How to Change a Habit.

 

[Daniel E.]

Re: 20 Tricks to Nuke a Bad Habit

Tips on breaking bad habits
Los Angeles Times
By Karen Ravn
April 6, 2009

Breaking a bad habit is a little like breaking up with a spouse with whom you have serious differences but also have a child: The old habit will always be part of your life. So you need to find ways to cope.

* Eliminate whatever reward or payoff the habit gives. This is easier to do with rats than with people: If you have a habit of buying your lunch at the vending machine at work, for example, there's really no way to arrange for the machine to be empty every time you automatically head over there at noon. But in other cases, you have more control. If you have a habit of eating ice cream every night before you go to bed, you can get rid of all the ice cream in your freezer.

Of course, you might still head for the kitchen for a few nights, only to find the freezer bare. But after a while, the cold hard truth of your deprivation will sink in, and you'll stop making the trip.

* Don't leave a hole where a bad habit used to be. Sometimes substituting new, improved behaviors for old bad ones will help. You could try bringing your lunch instead of buying it at the vending machine, or eating a piece of fruit before bed instead of a bowl of ice cream.

And if you want to stop spending too much money at the mall every Saturday, come up with something else to do at that time. Take a class. Take your pugs to the dog park. If you have nothing on your plate, it's too likely you'll decide to have one last shopping spree.

Substitution isn't foolproof, says Mark Bouton, a psychology professor at the University of Vermont. The old habit is still lurking in your brain waiting to make a comeback. So:

* Choose wisely. If you try to replace a bad, old habit with a good, new one, make sure the new one isn't too unpleasant. If you try to replace ice cream before bed with cod liver oil, you're probably doomed to fail.

* Be risk averse. Suppose you're a shoe addict -- you can't go into a shoe store without buying three pairs. So stay out of shoe stores. Habits are driven by situations. Figure out which situations are most tempting, and avoid them.

* Get down to specifics. Sometimes you can identify triggers that are most likely to bring out your bad habit. These can involve people, locations or preceding actions. So maybe it's actually safe for you to go into shoe stores to look around -- just don't do it with the friend who's dying to buy a pair, but only if you do too.

* Practice. Practice. Practice. Here, there and everywhere. Suppose you gossip a lot, and you want to stop. So you practice not gossiping at work with friend X, and you get very good at it. Then one day you go shopping with X. Watch out! Studies suggest that you're at risk for a relapse.

Not only that, but if you break your gossip habit at work with X, you may still keep gossiping there with W, Y and Z.

In general, a habit can be associated with many different places, people, activities, etc. -- and will stay broken only in the particular situations where you break it. So if you're trying to break a habit, practice in as many situations as you can.

* Use cues and rewards to your advantage. Maybe you want to save money for a trip to Hawaii, but you have an unfortunate habit of maxing out your credit cards. Try taping a picture of Waikiki Beach to your billfold to remind yourself not to splurge on non-necessities. Or maybe you're trying to break your choco-lot habit. Promise yourself a piece of your favorite candy once a week, but only if the rest of the time you don't indulge.

* Follow through on your good intentions. Studies have shown that a simple "if-then" plan can make a big difference. In one study published last year, having such a plan helped one group achieve its goal of eating less of a particular snack food and helped another group achieve its goal of performing well in a tennis match.

Participants in the eating-less group were given this line: "If I think about my chosen food, then I will ignore that thought!" and were told to say it to themselves three times and to commit themselves to acting on it.

The tennis group was told to compose four "if-then" statements of their own and write them down. The statements were to be of the form: "If I feel angry, then I will calm myself and tell myself, 'I will win!' "

Peter Gollwitzer, professor of psychology at New York University in New York City and at the University of Konstanz in Germany, says, "There's hardly any health behavior it doesn't work for."

* Show how highly evolved you are. Suppose you procrastinate whenever you ought to be doing something you don't want to do. (Even if you want to break your procrastination habit, you may just keep putting it off.) The trouble is, procrastination provides instant gratification, and even though you usually have to pay, that doesn't come till later on.

Fortunately, as we have seen, people have a unique ability to project themselves into the future. So remind yourself of that when you're tempted to work on your tan and put off working on your taxes.

* Tap into your willpower. It's easy to succumb to old, familiar habits. But a 2007 paper published in the journal Emotion found that we can resist temptation more successfully if we consider it a test of will.

In one study, undergraduate students were asked to squeeze a dynamometer, or handgrip, as hard and for as long as they could. Those who considered the task a test of willpower squeezed the device longer than those who didn't.

In a second study, students were asked to perform the same gripping task twice. Those who didn't consider the task a test of willpower the first time, but did the second time, improved their performance.

In a third test, students took two timed math tests on one computer while funny comedy clips were playing on a neighboring one. The students were told they could earn money by doing well on the tests. But in order to do well, it was obvious that they couldn't watch the clips -- i.e., they had to resist temptation. Between the two math tests, half of the students received a suggestion that they should consider the situation a test of willpower. They were better able than the other students to resist watching the videos.

* Don't believe everything you read. You may have found precise numbers stated about just how often you need to do something to make a new, good habit -- and just how often you need to not do something to break an old bad habit. Some say three weeks! Some say 30 days!

Don't count on it. "There is no data on this," says Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in Bethesda, Md. She predicts that the time will vary for people to establish a new habit, because some fall easily into routines and others don't. Likewise, your circumstances and stage of life will probably influence your ability to break a routine.

* What doesn't make you give up makes you stronger. If you fall off the wagon, don't quit trying. Studies (in rats, admittedly) suggest that occasional lapses don't make you more likely to fail in the long run.

So if you're trying to stop chewing your nails, just one little nibble won't condemn you to eternal onychophagia. (And if you're trying to forgo your erstwhile habit of using show-offy long words -- that would be hippopotomonstrosesquipedalianism -- one use of a word like "onychophagia" isn't the end of the world, either.)

There's a tendency on such occasions to decide you've blown it and give up. But it's important to regroup.

Habits are strong. But you can be stronger.

 

[Daniel E.]

10 ways to get motivated for change in 2010
By Elizabeth Landau, CNN.com
December 29, 2009

A new decade is about to start, and you may be tempted to set a copious list of resolutions for yourself in order to broadly "make life better." You may be thinking that you'll jump in on January 1 to reform everything from diet to relationships to personality.

That, experts say, is the wrong approach. It's great to want to make changes, but in order to actually accomplish your goals, they say, it's important to be realistic, specific, and accountable.

Here are 10 things you can do to help yourself stay in a mindset to make positive changes in the coming year:

1. Set smaller goals with smaller steps
Gradual small steps motivate people toward larger change, said Susan Nolen-Hoeksema, professor of psychology at Yale University and author of the new book The Power of Women.

If you want to lose weight, for example, change small aspects of your eating pattern. Resolve to have a salad tomorrow for lunch, and then do that for a week.

Write down the steps you want to take in a datebook to make it concrete, and reward yourself for making the individual changes, she said.

Let's say you want to work on being more optimistic this year. Nolen-Hoeksema recommends imagining what you would be like if you were optimistic. Imagine yourself going through a day at work if you were optimistic and confident, then write that down in great detail.

Now, you have specific aspects of that ideal of optimism to work toward. Pick one thing that the optimistic you is doing that you're not, and start working in that direction, she said.

2. Frame your goals positively
Despite the proven health risks of certain habits, such as smoking, thinking about a habit in the negative will not help you nix it. Studies have shown that it's hard to get motivated about avoiding cancer, but easier to think about smelling better and saving money as reasons to quit smoking, Nolen-Hoeksema said.

So, if you want to quit doing something, think about the positive aspects of not doing it. And make sure you reward yourself for sticking to the plan along the way.

3. Look at the pros and cons
If you're on the fence about whether you should make a change this year, make a list of the benefits and costs, said Dr. Nadine Kaslow, professor of psychiatry at Emory University.

Pay attention to what's driving you, she said. Sometimes it's pain that motivates people to change, or a new phase of life, or new information, or a possible promotion.

"It helps to get clear about what you want to change and why you want to change it," she said.

4. Get a resolutions buddy
Knowing that someone else is working toward similar goals, or is supporting you in your endeavors, helps to keep motivation up. Having a new year's resolution buddy who's keeping track of your progress helps keep you accountable for what you've done.

At the end of every year, Kaslow and her friend review all of their goals from the prior year, examining what the obstacles were to change and then developing new goals for the next year.

Planning for goals with someone can guide you in the path towards change, even if you don't don't accomplish everything in a single year, she said.

5. Be specific
It's easy to get discouraged by a broad goal like "I'm going to improve my marriage," Nolen-Hoeksema said. Figure out exactly what it is that's not working for you, and then formulate a strategy for solving individual problems.

In the marriage example, it's important to get realistic about what it is about your marriage that needs improvement. Then, spend some time keeping a diary and tracking what's going right and what's not, and come up with one thing you can do per week that would help the situation.

The process of assessing the small actions you can take in the immediate future, and savoring the positive effects, can take a lot of pressure off and help you achieve larger goals, she said.

6. Know thyself
The start of the year is as good a time as any to take inventory of yourself. What are your passions? What do you want to be doing better? Take the time think about who you are and how you want life to be, said Craig Levine, a clinical psychologist in San Francisco, California.

Real change happens because you yourself want it, not because others want it for you, experts say.

"If it's something that doesn't connect to you and truly relate to you, just because someone says you should do something, if it doesn't resonate with you, it's not going to be as helpful as something that truly fits you," Levine said.

7. Examine deeper issues
Sometimes there are problems that need to be addressed before people can move forward with the change they want.

In some cases there are psychological impediments to making changes, Levine said. For example, some people fear failure so much that they unknowingly sabotage themselves. Self-esteem may also play a role -- some people don't feel they're worthy of being taken care of, he said.

If you think that there are deeper issues preventing you from moving forward in your life in some way, consult a mental health professional.

8. Don't be overanxious
Having a long list of lofty resolutions can create anxiety, so Nolen-Hoeksema recommends choosing anywhere between three and five overarching things to change.

For Kaslow, the word "resolution" connotes a "pass-fail" ultimatum, so she prefers using the word "goal."

Writing down your goals and how you plan to achieve them is a good way to beat anxiety, Levine said.

9. Be flexible
Although you should be specific about what you want to do, sometimes it helps to broaden your vision of what you're trying to accomplish. For instance, if you've been laid off from your job in the financial sector, it may not be immediately possible to find a similar position.

But if you are on the job market, the broader goal might be to support yourself or your family, Nolen-Hoeksema said. Having a wider vision of what constitutes success can free you up to explore other options that do help with the central purpose.

"Step back and say, 'Is there any way I can achieve that bigger goal without getting fixated on the goal I had before?'" she said.

10. Keep your eye on the ball
Changing behaviors is especially difficult when other people around you encourage habits you're trying to kick, or if you are under stress. For instance, if you're a recovering alcoholic and having a bad day, it might be hard to resist if someone says, "It looks like you need a drink," Kaslow said.

Know that there's going to be some anxiety, but be patient with yourself, Kaslow said. Take it one incident at a time, one day at a time.

"You have to deal with some negative consequences when you change, both internal and interpersonal, and environmental," she said. "You have to sort of get help dealing with those, and weather those storms."

 

[Daniel E.]

Don't Worry So Much About Long-term Goals
by Leo Babauta, 6changes.com
December 22, 2009

One of the things that side-tracks a lot of people is the become impatient, because they’re interested in long-term goals such as losing a lot of weight or getting a flat stomach or getting out of debt.

Those are good goals, to be sure, but if you’re focused on such long-term goals, you’re going to have a difficult time.

I should know — I’ve focused on those very goals. I desperately wanted to get out of debt, to build up my blog, to lose a lot of weight. And you know what? I’ve done all of them, but I discovered along the way that it takes a lot longer than I expected at first.

And that can be discouraging. You want to see all the fat melt off, but despite exercising furiously and eating really healthy foods, it doesn’t come off right away. Not in a week or two, a month or two, or even six months (depending on how far you have to go).

For most of us, getting out of debt will take longer than six months - maybe well over a year or two. That’s too long to wait - we’ll get discouraged well before that point when we first taste success.

So the key here is to focus on the process, not the progress.

Don’t worry about how far you’ve gotten to your final goal — that could take a lot longer than you expect, and if it does, you’ll get discouraged.

Instead, focus on creating that new habit. Focus on right now, today, not next week or next year. Focus on enjoying the activity, not on trying to get to the destination.

When you enjoy the journey, guess what? You’re already at the destination. When you finally get to that flat stomach or get out of debt, you’ll be happy, but incredibly, you’ve been happy all along the way, because the journey is what has been important.

Forget about the long-term goals. Focus on creating your new habit, right now. You’ll get there eventually, and you’ll love every minute of the ride.

 

[adaptive1]

Thanks for the habit changing articles, I was looking for some ideas. Nothing major I want to change for once, I am much more content these days with things and who I am, but there is always room for improvement...

I often see things like it takes 21 days or 30 days to change a habit, just wondering if there is any proof of this, I think it is referenced in one of the articles below and I have heard this on occassion before.

It has taken me years to get rid of some of my habits, of which some were certainly in the realm of OCD, so maybe 30 days isnt realistic for that. Perhaps it depends what the habits were and how much they were part of your life. I do think sometimes we get rid of some habits when we are ready to give them up, and the trick is to replace them with something neutral or positive.

If I figure it out I will let you guys know.