10 Powerful Ways to Build a Habit that Sticks
- Start small
- Be realistic
- Write down the date, time, location
- Keep a progress record
- Use an app
- Get inspired
- Join a group
- Enlist a friend
- Reward the effort
- Get a coach
Start Small
I often see people trying to change everything about their lives all at once. Then, when they fail to make the changes stick, they think something is wrong with them.
But that is not the case at all.
Change takes time, consistency, and commitment. If you try to change too many things at once, you are setting yourself up for failure. You will feel overwhelmed, which often leads to procrastination, and you may feel like giving up.
Instead, you will be far more likely to succeed if you only make 1 small, but sustainable, change at a time.
Your first step is to be clear about your goals and priorities.
What is the first goal you want to achieve?
Why that one in particular?
Why is it your priority?
How will your life change once you achieve it? Will you be healthier? Fitter? Happier?
How can you breakdown your goal into tiny, daily steps?
If your goal is to eat healthier, what is one small way you can start? Is it maybe to add spinach to your smoothie? Have a chocolate covered banana instead of a Snickers bar? Or, have a salad for lunch instead of a sandwich?
The first baby-step you choose should be easy for you to do and incorporate into your life.
Be Realistic
It will be far easier to succeed if you start with a change that is tiny enough to do every day but not so radical that you give up on it before you even start.
For example, if your goal is to improve your fitness, it might not be very realistic to sign up for fitness classes for every single day of the week.
Rather, going to a fitness class 3 times a week would be much easier to stick to.
Say your goal is to eat more vegetables.
Instead of buying enough veggies for every meal for an entire week, it might be more realistic and achievable to only buy enough for 3 dinners. Plus, you can look for a few recipes before doing your shopping so that you know exactly what to buy.
The point is to set a goal that is small enough to do at least several times a week and that you can easily fit into your lifestyle but not so drastic that you have to flip your life upside down in order to fit it in.
So, ask yourself:
What is 1 small change I can do everyday or every other day that will move me closer to my goal?
Write down the Date, Time and Location
Visual cues are some of the most powerful stimuli for your brain. In fact, more than 50% of the cerebral cortex is dedicated to visual processing!
A great way to harness all that brain power is to write down what your small step will be, at what time you will do it, on which day, and where it will happen.
It can look something like this:
On Monday morning, at 8am, while I drink my coffee at the dining table, I will do 5 minutes of breath work.
Or:
On Tuesday and Thursday afternoon, at 5:30pm, I will go directly from work to my pilates class at my local gym.
Or:
On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, I will set an alarm for 5pm. When it rings, I will immediately go to the kitchen, take out a protein and some veggies from the fridge, and I will start preparing my dinner.
When you write down the step-by-step process of the change you want to make, several things happen.
You help to make your brain more aware and focused on the goal and it also helps your brain to remember that you want to do it.
Also, when you write down your goal, it is a visual cue of how important it is to you. You can add a check mark next to it every time you accomplish a step or progress toward your goal. Make adjustments, if you need to, in order to make sure you follow through.
When you think about your current goal, think about these questions:
How can I remember to do it? Should I set a alarm? Use an app? Schedule it in my calendar? Write it down in my planner?
Where will this change happen? In my kitchen? At the gym? At the office?
Keep a progress record
It can be very effective and motivating to keep a journal that is just for your goal so that you can write down the exact steps you want to take, track your progress, and make adjustments if necessary.
Too often, people do not even start their goals because they literally do not know what steps to take.
Any confusion is quickly cleared away when you write down exactly what action you want to take, when, and where as discussed in the previous section.
Additionally, a written record helps you see exactly when you stuck to your baby steps and when you skipped them.
After a week or a month of tracking your successes, you will be amazed at how much progress you have a actually made.
You can keep track of your progress with check marks, you can color in bars for each time you succeed, you can place a sticker on the days you accomplish your goal, and so on.
Being able to actually see and measure your progress can be a great motivator to get you started and keep going.
When you encounter a setback (hey, life happens!), you can see exactly what tripped you up and you can think of ways to help you get back on track as well as what you can do to minimize the interruption when other hiccups occur.
Use an App
A simple way to remind yourself to take you action steps and track how well you are doing is to use an app.
There are a plethora of apps out there. Some gamify habit tracking, others incentivize you to stick to your habits by putting a sum of money at stake. Here are a few examples:
Make it a game: Habitica
Visual progress: Way of Life
Monetary consequences: Stickk
Simple tracking (Android only): Loop
Habit building based on James Clear’s Atomic Habits: Atoms
An app makes it super easy to track your habits and goals. Plus, most apps are designed to be visually appealing. It can be very motivating in and of itself to see your progress and want to keep going simply so that you do not break your streak.
To ensure you do not forget to complete your action step, just turn on the app’s notifications.
Get Inspired
Something that helps me a great deal is to study what successful people have done or are doing.
How do they start their day? How many hours do they work? What are their non-negotiables? Do they meditate? What is a common practice among them? What have they stopped doing and why?
It really motivates me to see what it takes to become successful.
If you are trying to lose weight, how about looking for someone who has already achieved what you are aiming for? Many people have recorded their health and fitness transformations online and on social media. They post about theirs wins, struggles, and progress photos.
If you want to become a doctor, who can you look up to who has forged that path and documented it? Perhaps that person is on Instagram, Facebook, or on YouTube like Dr. Rachel Southard. Maybe they have even written a book!
Pay attention to what they have had to master and solve. It will give you clues as to what to watch out for and how to address the problem should it arise.
Many people who have found success have had to overcome many, many failures. To me, this humanizes the process and shows me that the road to greatness is bumpy for everyone.
Another thing that I find very helpful is to notice their mindset. Usually, you will find that no matter what happens or how many times they have to start over, these people persevere. They stick to their goals even if it takes them years to succeed.
Join a Group
Sometimes, what you need is to be around people who have the same goal as you.
It is so much easier to become fit if you surround yourself with runners. Or, to cook healthier when you go to a weekly cooking class. Or, to finally make progress on your book when you are part of a writing club.
Your fellow group members will likely be going through the same struggles you are and will be able to support you and cheer you on. They can also help you troubleshoot when you get stuck.
Some of my clients struggle to make changes in their lives only because their environment (including family members) creates roadblocks on their path to transformation.
When your home or work environment does not support you or blocks you from achieving what you desire, it can make all the difference in the world to find a place, group, or club where people root for you and encourage you to stick to your goal.
Enlist a friend
Perhaps you already have a support system you have not tapped into.
Do you have a friend who could help you stick to your objective? You might already know someone who has the same aim you do.
Your friend can become your accountability buddy and help you stay on track. They can go to the gym with you, you can check in with them when you hit a hard patch, or you can simply message them when you accomplish your target for the day.
A friend can help you stay motivated and encourage you to keep going and not give up on yourself. Plus, the fact that someone else is involved in your goal will add a little bit more weight to it because you will not want to disappoint them.
The degree to which you include your friend is entirely up to you but the more they are a part of your target, the greater their influence (and your accountability) will be.
Reward the Effort
According to Dr. Andrew Huberman, it is better to reward the effort, as you are making it, rather than the completed action.
On his podcast, Huberman Lab, Dr. Huberman describes people with a growth mindset as those who see effort as the aim itself.
If you reward yourself for a task well done, you are in fact reinforcing the pleasure of the end result rather than the task itself. The outcome is you still dread doing the task-the only thing that keeps you motivated to do it again is the reward you give yourself once you have finished it.
Instead, it is far better to get the rush of dopamine while you are accomplishing your task. This way, your brain understands that effort=reward. Over time, the goal is to look forward to the task, rather than dread it, and enjoy the process itself.
An added benefit of switching your mindset in this way is that once you put effort into one task, it seems to have a trickle down effect and you may find yourself achieving more in other areas of your life.
A great example of enjoying effort is when you get into a “flow state”. Time ceases to exist and you just zoom through your work. Effort becomes pleasurable.
So, when you want to introduce a new habit into your life, make sure you reward and congratulate yourself while you actively perform the habit.
Eating healthier? Watch a fun YouTube video while you eat.
Going to the gym? Enjoy that piece of chocolate while you leg press.
Need to learn a new skill for work? Treat yourself to your favorite Starbucks drink while you learn.
Get a Coach
Oprah, Leonardo DiCaprio, Eric Schmidt (former Google CEO), Richard Branson, Steve Jobs, Jeff Weiner (founder of LinkedIn).
What do these people have in common?
They have all hired coaches.
Even major universities and publications are getting in on it.
Harvard recognizes that health coaching is effective and points to a study that found it even had a positive influence on participants’ biomarkers!
The Mayo Clinic found that health coaching was effective for improved quality of life, perceived stress level, and depressive symptoms.
Forbes published a stellar article about the benefits of coaching. The author of the article highlights the fact that being regularly held accountable by someone, such as a coach, can make you 95% more likely to accomplish your goal!
This figure comes out of a study by the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD).
Yale, Mayo Clinic, Duke, among others, offer health coaching services to patients.
An increasing number of hospitals, doctors, and insurers include coaching as part of their services. They understand that the healthier their patients are, the more cost effective their business becomes.
A coach is a trained professional who helps you create realistic and sustainable changes that fit your goals and lifestyle on your own terms.
They are with you every step of the way and are your biggest supporters because your success is their success.
A coach is trained to be free of judgment and to use motivational interviewing and guide the conversation in such a way as to elicit your own reasons for change.
They are also there to help you get back on track when life throws curveballs at you. A coach helps you troubleshoot what caused a setback and helps you come up with solutions and steps you can take to mitigate hiccups when they happen.
Finally, one of the most powerful benefits of coaching is that you have a professional who holds you accountable to what you say you will do. As we have seen above, the simple fact of having an ongoing accountability appointment makes you 95% more likely to successfully hit your goal!
So what are you waiting for?
Send me a message here and we’ll get started!
Resources:
3. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6172040/
4. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/health-coaching-is-effective-should-you-try-it-2020040819444
7. https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2018/08/14/three-steps-to-overcoming-resistance/
Contact Me
Send a Message
Fill out the form below to reach out. I'm here to answer your questions and help you take the first step toward a healthier, balanced life.