All Things Inspired

Harnessing the power of habits can lead to success!

The power of habits can be life changing! Harnessing the power of habits can lead you to success. However, it will take time and effort to change habits. Once they are formed, a habit can be difficult to change. You can certainly change your bad habits to good ones, but there are some pitfalls to be aware of and avoid. Here's a few things to consider...

You must focus on one habit at a time. If you engage in changing too many behaviors at once, you may become overwhelmed, and the anxiety will destroy your efforts.
You must be committed to changing the habit. It takes time and repetition to form the new habit. That takes commitment! You've probably heard the theory that an action change takes 21 days to make a habit. A study by researchers at University College of London in 2009 found that it takes 66 days on average, and sometimes as much as 254 days for your choice to change to become a habit. So, be patient with yourself!
You must take control of everything within your environment. This will take awareness to avoid falling into the old habit at the first sign of stress or discomfort in the change.

Being aware of these potential pitfalls can help you avoid becoming too focused on the outcome. It takes identifying the bad habits one at a time, commitment to change, and controlling the process of changing the bad to good.

Now, let's take a quick look at how to build good new habits by breaking the bad ones.

Create it by making it obviously good and the bad habit being replaced becomes invisible.
Make it easy to be good, thus making the bad habit more difficult to accept as ok.
Make the good new habit satisfying. Create the mindset that bad habits have been unsatisfying.

Why is it hard to change habits? The most logical reason is that, as we said earlier, a habit is formed over time. A habit is automatic in action. That means when changing a bad habit or installing a new positive habit, it too must become automated. To help the process of breaking bad habits, try the following five actions...

Make certain you have identified the bad habit needing attention.
Understand what triggers the bad habit.
Replace it with a new, positive, behavior.
Establish a positive environment for yourself.
Track your progress. Be mindful of the process to ensure it progresses.

Congratulations! You've changed bad habits to good! That's got to be overwhelmingly satisfying. But how do you maintain the new habit? Here's some points to ponder on sustaining the change...

It must become a part of your daily life schedule. New positive habits can easily be discarded if you don't keep them a part of your regular routine. Again, routine is intentional, whereas habit is developed into being automatic.
Don't be too critical of yourself. You've proved to yourself that change is possible. Now remind yourself that it took effort to form the new habit, and it will be a constant awareness journey to maintain it.
Support comes within the right environment. We've said it before, surround yourself with like-minded people. They know what it takes to change and how to support the continued journey of positive habits.
Maintain consistency around the habit. Being consistent is one of the obvious elements of forming a habit.
Avoid the triggers that may cause you to relapse into the bad habit of the past.
It must be realistic, otherwise it becomes too difficult and thus too easy to give up on developing the new habit.
Track your progress. We've reiterated this point several times prior to this topic, but it's too important not to devote attention to the fact that you are progressing.

Over the course of this topic on the power of habits we've had frequent recurrence of the steps or suggestions to developing positive habits. But that's okay, after all we are talking about habits, and you don't form good habits without repeating the process again and again.

Once you experience the pattern of change you create in building positive habits, you might just find that good habits are as addictive as the bad ones. But it will be much more rewarding! Cultivating the power of habits is life changing! It won't be easy but you can do it! You are more capable than you might realize. Start now by making a habit to...

Be inspired! Inspire others!