An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones
1847941842
James Clear
Notes
Fix the inputs and the outputs will take care of themselves. You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.
Your behaviors are usually a reflection of your identity. What you do is an indication of the type of person you believe that you are – either consciously or unconsciously…It is worth noting that it is important to select short-term rewards that reinforce your identity rather than ones that conflict with it.
Four Laws of Behavior Change:
- Make it obvious
- Make it attractive
- Make it easy
- Make it satisfying
Habits Scorecard, which is a simple exercise you can use to become more aware of your behavior. To create your own, make a list of your daily habits…If it is a good habit, write “+” next to it. If it is a bad habit, write “-” next to it. If it is a neutral habit, write “=”.
Environment is the invisible hand that shapes human behavior…One space, one use…I have never seen someone stick to positive habits in a negative environment…One of the most effective things you can do to build better habits is to join a culture where your desired behavior is the normal behavior.
Use temptation bundling for procrastination. Habit stacking + Temptation bundling =
- After I (current habit), I will (habit I need).
- After (habit I need), I will (habit I want)
Simply putting in your reps is one of the most critical steps you can take to encoding a new habit.
It is human nature to follow the Law of Least Effort which states that when deciding between two similar options, people will naturally gravitate toward the option that requires the least amount of work…the less energy a habit requires, the more likely it is to occur…Much of the battle of building better habits comes down to finding ways to reduce the friction associated with our good habits and increase the friction associated with our bad ones.
The more you ritualize the beginning of a process, the more likely it becomes that you can slip into the state of deep focus that is required to do great things.
…one of the most consistent findings is that the way to maintain motivation and achieve peak levels of desire is to work on tasks of “just manageable difficulty.
How to Create a Good Habit
- Make it Obvious
- 1.1 Habits Scorecard – Write down your current habits to become aware of them.
- 1.2 Implementation Intentions – “I will [behavior] at [time] in [location].”
- 1.3 Habit Stacking – “After [current habit] I will [new habit].”
- 1.4 Design your environment. Make the cues of good habits obvious and visible.
- Make it Attractive
- 2.1 Temptation Bundling – Pair an action you want to do with an action you need to do.
- 2.2 Join a culture where your desired behavior is a normal behavior.
- 2.3 Motivation Ritual – Do something you enjoy immediately before a difficult habit.
- Make it Easy
- 3.1 Reduce Friction – Decrease the number of steps between you and your good habits.
- 3.2 Prime the environment – Prepare your environment to make future actions easier.
- 3.3 Master the decisive moment – Optimize the small choices that deliver outsized impact.
- 3.4 2-Minute Rule – Downscale your habits until they can be done in two minutes or less.
- 3.5 Automate your habits – Invest in technology and one-time purchases that lock in future behavior.
- Make it Satisfying
- 4.1 Reinforcement – Give yourself an immediate reward when you complete your habit.
- 4.2 – Make “doing nothing” enjoyable – When avoiding a bad habit, design a way to see the benefits.
- 4.3 Habit Tracker – Keep you habit streak and don’t “break the chain.”
- 4.4 Never miss twice – When you forget to do a habit, make sure you get back on track immediately.
- Plateau of Latent Potential
- Implementation Intention
- Habits Scorecard
- Habit Stacking
- Habit Tracker
- Goldilocks Rule