How-to Best Break a Habit
/We all have them, but how do we break them? And most importantly, how do we replace a not-so-good habit, with a good one?
Habits come in all shapes and forms, and whether they’re good or bad – we all have them. Maybe we’ve only just picked one up, or it’s an age-old habit for years. Habits aren’t just biting our fingernails, or using swear words...they can be bigger – draining our time and energy, both mentally and physically, and leading to an unproductive day, or even life period.
Change can sometimes be hard, but with the right techniques, and patience, we can train our brain, and set it up for all kinds of success. By re-wiring our automatic response and thought-patterns, we can change a not-so-helpful habit into a good one!
MAKE ROUTINE A HABIT
Think back to the early days when your parents would make you to go to bed early, to ensure that you could rise early to grab a nutritious breakfast, and make the school bus – whether we enjoyed getting up at this time or not, this fundamental action set us into a habitual routine, allowing us for success in our day-to-day lives. Maybe we’ve fallen out of touch with it; allowing ourselves to sleep in and grab breakfast on the go – all leading to a not-so-productive day, and feeling resentful of ourselves.
So what’s the solution here? Replace the habit you don’t want with a good habit. Get reacquainted with that positive routine– it could all start with something as simple as going to bed an hour earlier, and planning out a nutritious breakfast the night before. Don’t overthink it, because it’s most probably a super simple adjustment to your regular routine!
UNDERSTAND WHAT TRIGGERS IT
Our environment plays a major part in our habits, and learning more about what is around us can help us form the habits we desire. Scan through your environment, and try to identify the triggers that could be forming the habit you want to replace. If you eat sweet treats when they’re in the house, make an effort not to purchase them. If you are drinking too much coffee during your day, bring some herbal tea to the office. If you’re too talkative and not getting enough done, have some headphones at your desk. So what’s the point here? When we change our environment, we simply changing the outcome.
VISUALISE YOUR SUCCESS
Super simple. You are the designer of your destiny. Whatever habit you are trying to break, or alternatively, whatever habit you’re trying to create – visualise yourself achieving it, and most importantly, what will come of this achievement.
YOU ARE STILL YOU. NOBODY ELSE.
You are unique, and you are YOU. In order to form new habits, or break a bad one, you don’t need to be anybody else but yourself – you may just need to tap into the old you. That healthy person you want to become? Who is that? How about a re-introduction to the healthy person you used to be? Again, through the right frame of mind, and even if this good habit was part of us many years ago, you might be surprised at how easy it is to say hello to that person again. You have got this!
NEGATIVE SELF-TALK
We know… it can be super easy to judge ourselves when we fall off the bike. But the only way we’re going to reach that destination is by getting back on it. Positive affirmations can help us understand that we will get there.
Try this (and repeat):
“I may have fallen off the bike this time but I’ll get back on and eventually reach my destination.”
