Is the thing you’re doing now helping you get closer to you goals? If not, it’s time that you start developing new habits.
Here’s a quote that recently caught my attention:
‘Many people look forward to the New Year for a new start on old habits.’ – Anonymous
The quote reminded me of a book I’ve read.
But before moving on, let me ask you these questions:
Wouldn’t it be great if you could exercise just once and have it last forever?
Wouldn’t it be great if you could shower just once and be clean forever?
And wouldn’t it be great if you could just sleep once and be well-rested forever?
Think of all the resources and time that you’d save.
But you and I know that’s not the case.
At least in this reality that we live in.
You know that you need to do these things time and time again.
What do we call those little bits of behaviours that we do repeatedly day in and out?
That’s right, we call them habits.
WHAT ARE HABITS?
Well, habits are behaviours that we do almost without giving it any conscious thought.
They’re ingrained in us.
Aristotle once said, ‘we are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, isn’t an act but it’s a habit.’
See, most people think that life is about pulling a big rabbit out of the hat once and being successful forever.
But again, we know that’s not the case.
It’s the little bits we do over and over and over and over again that helps us achieve excellence if not success.
Now the reason I’m excited and wanted to share this piece with you is I’ve just come across a book called ‘The One Thing.’ I highly recommend you check out this book.
Inside, researchers from the University College of London discussed how long it takes for something to become a new habit.
HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO FORM A NEW HABIT?
Obviously, the time it takes to form a new habit has to be determined through research.
It’s going to take some measure of time, alongside the presence one important attribute: discipline.
So time and discipline are the two variables.
So the research discussion tells us that we need to actually discipline ourselves to do something.
Sure enough, the researchers tested this on subjects in relation to new diet and exercise habits.
What the researchers tracked is the time when the exercise habit actually became what they called ingrained or automatic.
And the answer is 66 days.
Two months or more for the participants to develop the habit of exercising.
That’s the average, though results showed a range of 18 – 245 days.
WHY AM I TALKING ABOUT FORMING NEW HABITS?
Of course, you wanted to know why I’m sharing this with you.
This is the time of year when people are going to make their New Year’s resolutions.
They’ll want to improve their life.
And if you are to improve your life, you’ll need to form the habits that’ll help you do that.
But do you have to become a robot of discipline to be able to pull this off?
Absolutely not!
You only have to be disciplined 66 days to pull this off.
Maybe that’s 66 days in a row to just get out of bed and go for a 30-minute walk.
Maybe that’s 66 times to reach for some fruit or vegetables instead of chocolates.
It’s what we call selective discipline.
If you can do that just 66 times based on this research, you’ll form a new habit.
The good thing about this is that, once you develop that new habit, you can then build upon it or you can go and add a new habit!
WILL YOU DEVELOP A NEW HABIT THIS YEAR?
Now the exciting part is that researchers in Australia found that when a new positive habit is mastered, all areas of life improves.
This is called the ‘Halo Effect,’ and all it took was mastering one new positive habit.
So I want to encourage you to harness the power of selective discipline and to maintain and form one brand new habit.
You’ll get the halo effect on all of them.
Remember, habits are hard to form but they’re easy to maintain.
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