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“Our character is basically a composite of our habits.” — Stephen Covey
Do you every wonder why some people are able to change a destructive pattern or behavior in their life while others aren’t? Or, why some athletes or businesses are able to execute flawlessly while others don’t?
We all make choices, that when done repeatedly, become habits. When something becomes a habit we stop making a choice, and the habit becomes automatic. By understanding how it happens, we can choose to rebuild the pattern.
I recently finished reading the Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. The book establishes a framework for understanding how habits work. There are four steps that can serve as a framework to create new habits.
MIT researches discovered a neurological loop that is resident in every habit. The loop consists of a routine, a reward and a cue.
Step One: Identify the Routine
I used to check my email first thing in the morning. I found that often I would spend most of the morning responding to emails and doing work related to those emails. That left the afternoon to do more important project and client work. Often that work is more intensive, time consuming and requires more energy and focus than email.
I’m a morning person, so most of my project and client work should be done in the morning, when I am more focused and energetic.
Once I identified the habit loop of this particular behavior that I wanted to change, I looked for ways to substitute it with new routines.
Step Two: Experiment with Rewards
Rewards satisfy our cravings, but we’re not always aware of how they drive our behavior. Sometimes experimentation helps us figure it out. Write down how you feel or what you experience when you follow the old routine. For me, it was a sense of accomplishment.
I felt like I got more done by handling email in the morning. It took less time and energy than project work. So I had to figure out a new reward system for project work. What I did was split it into smaller pieces, so that I felt like I was making progress by completing part of the work, rather than waiting until the whole thing was complete.
Step Three: Isolate the Cue
We are bombarded by so much information, that it is often hard to identify a cue, which establishes a habit. In my case, it was the “ding” of the emails coming into my in-box. Experiments have shown that almost all habitual cues fit into one of five categories:
- Location
- Time
- Emotional state
- Other people
- Immediately preceding action
After a few days of keeping track of these five categories, a cue to a habit can usually be identified. The “ding” of my email needed to be silenced.
Step Four: Have a Plan
Once you’ve figured out your routine, identified the reward that drives the behavior and the cue that triggers it, you can begin to change the behavior. A habit is something our brain does automatically. To change it, we have to begin making different choices. We need a plan, and need to follow it consistently in order to change a habit.
What habits have you found difficult to change in your life or business?