Atomic Habits - James Clear
We all want to build better habits. We know that we will be better off if we work out consistently and take time to read and reflect. Yet why don’t we? There are plenty of reasons: we get discouraged when we don’t keep it up, discouraged if we don’t see immediate results; or we think we don’t have enough time. James Clear attacks all of these barriers (and others) by hacking our basic habit forming operating system. At the core, habits are a cycle of cue, craving, response, and reward cycle. Hack these and you can build better results.
Some of the key takeaways I’m putting into action:
- Change your identity. Instead of “I am trying to work out 3 times a week”, “I am a person that works out 3 times a week”
- Make your desired habits easy and obvious; do the opposite for your bad habits
- In the beginning, consistency is more important than optimization. If you need to, start a new habit so small that you’d be an idiot not to just do it. Once you have that going, start building on it.
- Hack your desire to fit in and join a group that has the habits you want (but is still relatable).
- Give yourself a tangible reward for NOT doing the habits you are trying to break and for habits that don’t normally give immediate rewards. Our monkey brains respond best to immediate benefits so hack that “response” part of the habit cycle in a constructive way.