One of the keys to reaching a new goal is to have
habits in place that support that goal. If your current habits are counter-productive, you'll need
to change them or run the risk of coming up short.
How do habits help you reach your
goals?
Suppose you have the goal of
running a marathon: if you don’t already have the habit of running regularly,
you're unlikely to be successful until you can adopt that habit. Running
regularly can help you attain your goal in several ways, including getting you
in great physical shape and strengthening your endurance.
Developing supportive habits can be easier than you think and far more
powerful than you can imagine!
Identify the Habits You Need
Before you create new, positive
habits, you’ll want to figure out which habits will help you attain your goals.
For every goal, there are habits that can
practically guarantee success. Reflect on your goals and what actions you can take to
help bring them about.
Consider these attributes
for the habits you want to implement:
1.
Look for daily
habits. Habits you practice each day are much easier to put into place and
keep than those that are less frequent.
2.
Keep it simple. The more complex the task, the
less likely you are to stick with it. If you really do need to implement a
complex habit, start with a simpler version and then add more complexity later.
3.
Be
specific. It's not enough to just specify what you're going to do; include the how, when, and where as well. Time is
always critical when creating a new habit. Be sure to specify a precise period
of time in which you wish to implement the new actions.
·
So "I'm going to exercise 1 hour per day"
is inadequate. "I'm going to swim from 6-7 am, Monday through Friday at
the YMCA" is more like it. This has enough detail to be quite clear
about what you want to accomplish and includes the how, when and where.
Prepare for Interference.
There are usually obstacles to
creating new habits and behavioral patterns. Try to figure out these possibilities ahead of time so you can eliminate
them as soon as possible.
For example, if you've decided that
you're going to eat a healthy breakfast every day, get rid of all the breakfast
junk food in your pantry and freezer. That junk food is an obstacle to
successfully implementing your habit.
The obstacle might be time interference. Maybe your partner doesn’t usually
leave you alone for 30 minutes every night so you can meditate, write, read, or
whatever it is you want to do towards your goal. Simply let them know ahead of
time that you need be undisturbed during this time.
Look for More Supporting Habits.
When you
determine supporting habits that will help you reach your goal, consider going
even deeper into the details to find habits that will help you accomplish your
other new habits.
For example, if one of your new habits
is to make it to the gym every morning by 6:00 am, you can develop several supporting
habits to help you establish this habit, such as:
·
Get out of bed by 5:15 am.
·
In order to get up at 5:15 am each day, you might need an
additional habit of always being in bed by 10:00 pm.
· Another supporting habit might be to pack your gym bag the night before.
These supporting habits are monumentally important. Take time to think about what additional habits you can develop to support your efforts.
Enjoy Automatic Success.
Once an action becomes a habit,
you’ll do it automatically, without having to make the decision to do it each
time. In other words, you’ll
automatically move forward, day after day, toward achieving your goal until you
reach it.
Just as counter-productive habits can keep you from
success, supportive habits can practically guarantee your victory. So consider the
habits that will best support your goals, put them into action on a daily basis,
and enjoy your new success!
