In my last article I shared with you how to take an inventory on your habits and identify which ones were hurting you and which ones were helping you reach your goals. Self-awareness of our automatic behavior is the first step for getting back on the path to success, but the next step is just as important. You must now intentionally create new habits that will further your progress and help you reach your goals. Don’t worry about breaking the bad habits yet, just first work on creating new ones.
One of the mistakes people make when they set out to create new habits is that the action they want to start doing is way too big. For instance, if your goal is to lose 30 pounds and keep it off for life, a habit you may want to start doing is working out 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week, when you’re currently not working out regularly at all. This is a big change that will likely be too difficult to keep up when life gets busy and stressful, which it undoubtedly will.
Instead, BJ Fogg, a celebrated researcher from Stanford on behavior change and author of my favorite book on habits named Tiny Habits: Small changes that change everything encourages readers to start small and develop tiny habits that get bigger over time.
For instance, in his book Fogg writes about his desire to start flossing his teeth. Instead of creating a new habit where he flossed his entire mouth every night, Fogg created a new habit of flossing at least one tooth after brushing his teeth. Just one! After he flossed his one tooth of choice, he could happily floss more teeth and even his whole mouth, but the commitment he was making was just to floss one. After flossing just one tooth he would silently celebrate to himself to reinforce the behavior.
While it may seem silly to just floss one tooth, starting small works! If you want to start exercising on a regular basis again, start small and commit to just exercising for 5 minutes a day (instead of for instance 30 minutes a day) and you can always go longer if you have the energy.
I personally have started a habit where I exercise daily first thing in the morning (even before my coffee!). I just commit to a little bit of movement every day first thing in the morning, but usually I have the energy to go a full 20 minutes and get a true workout in.
In my next article I’ll share the formula for habit creation so you’ll be armed with the right steps to create a habit and have it stick! In the meantime, start thinking about what new, teeny tiny habits you want to add to your life that will help you reach your goals.
All my best,
Liz
PS - If you are needing help with identifying what new habits to create to help you reach your goals, or are ready to meet with me to share your vision for your life and seek the support you need to realize that vision, please email me at liz@lizbapasola.com to set up your first coaching call.