Ten tricks to make habits stick

When I heard that Dr Michael Mosley had died on holiday earlier this year I was very saddened. His pragmatic, practical and scientific approach to medical journalism has such immense value. I did so enjoy the entertainment spin that he could put on assisting us to become healthier. So, having missed the "Just One Thing" podcast which ran throughout the Covid-19 epidemic, I was pleased to learn that many of the tips had been combined into a short book (Mosley, 2022). I purchased it. And the audiobook.

And one useful set of tips which leapt out at me very early in the book were the ten things to do which will help us all to form better habits... so we are more likely to achieve our goals. What a great set of tips these are (Mosley, 2022, 3%):

1. Start small, and be realistic. Make one change at a time and see if it works
2. Imagine a clear goal. This is our "why" (Sinek, 2010), a visualisation which will help keep us motivated when our will power is low. For example, spurring ourselves to set up electronic payments by visualising a paperless office; or reminding ourselves to not eat that second biscuit by imagining wearing our wedding dress at our anniversary dinner 
3. Building changes into things we already do. For example, if we already do the accounts on a Friday, cap it off with a bank reconciliation. If we already do yoga in the morning, add in some squats
4. Do whatever it is regularly. It is the replication which makes new habits sticky. Daily, weekly, or hourly: it is the repetition which builds habits
5. Use 'triggers' so we remember to do the new thing. Triggers are a previous step which will lead us to the new habit we want to establish (e.g. accounts to a bank rec; yoga to squats)
6. Do it for a month. If it doesn't add value, adapt it, discard it, or dump it
7. Try to replace poor habits with better ones. If we ignore calendar reminders, try using alarms as well, or set up auto-call reminders. If we get tired in the middle of the day, eat lunch, then go for a walk outside straight away to keep our energy up
8. Get a buddy to share the journey. Doing things as a team makes habit-building much more enjoyable
9. Be kind to ourselves: we shouldn't beat ourselves up when things don't work for us. And we mustn't be afraid to do point 6, and dump those things which we gave a good nudge, but just don't work for us
10. Keep a record of what we are doing, what we are noticing, and what is changing. If we have a record, we really can start to see progress towards our new goals, and that in turn will push us along more :-)

Not all of these will assist every type of goal, but many will be helpful. And what a loss Dr Mosley is to us all. 

Sam

References:

Mosley, M. (2022). Just One Thing: How Simple Changes can Transform Your Life. Short Books.

Sinek, S. (2010, May 4). TED: How great leaders inspire action [video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/qp0HIF3SfI4