Thursday Thirteen: Habit Forming

ByKristen Koster

 

13 Things to Avoid When Changing Habits

 

As you can tell from Monday’s post, habits and routines have been on my mind alot.

Leo Babauta from Guam has a great blog titled: Zen Habits where you can go see his comments on these pitfalls. He gives permission to reprint his posts, but in what follows below are his pitfalls, followed by my own thoughts them. You should go explore the real thing if you have any interest in the topic.

I also love the quote he has on this post: “Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” by Jim Ryun.

1. Taking on two or more habits at once.
Yep. Guilty. Baby steps, one at a time.
2. Not committing a plan to paper.
The Accountability Corner thread at Romance Divas is especially helpful with this one. It’s semi-public accountability and forces me to look at least a week in the future.
3. Being half-committed.
Very Guilty. Repeatedly. Just wanting to establish a good habit or break a bad one isn’t enough. You have to actively work on it. Whoddathunkit?
4. Not having support.
This requires admitting you want to change to someone else too. Ewwww.
5. Not thinking through your motivation.
Because it’d be good for me isn’t enough. Goes back to that commitment thing.
6. Not realizing the obstacles.
Plan ahead.
7. Not logging your progress.
Again, I can look back at my Accountability Corner thread on Divas and see just when I stumbled, but I can also see the long runs of success as well.
8. Having no accountability.
Sick of hearing about the Accountability Corner yet? Too bad it’s just writing, although Bria and I talked about adding another category besides Writing Time and Writing Life to it next round.
9. Not knowing your triggers.
Logging your progress can help identify these and will help you plan ahead.
10. Not doing your reading.
Hmmm… my highly theoretical self is skeptical of this one. I guess it could be reinforcing motivations, but honestly I’ve never found it much help before.
11. Changing focus too soon.
Focus? Whazzat? I swear I’m related to gnats somedays.
12. Not being consistent.
Ooh. This one and the next sound familiar.
13. Quitting after failure.
This one is often too tempting and I can see where I’ve beaten it with some habits, but not others. Guess we better check that motivation thing again. Sigh.

Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

1 SandyCarlson 2 Tamy ~ 3 Sides of Crazy 3 Candy Minx
4 SJ Reidhead 5 Juliadamus 6 Jennifer McKenzie
7 Ava Rose Johnson 8 9

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25 Comments

  9. Yeah, Bernie, it’s much easier to not start the bad ones… the problem is building the good ones lately and managing to juggle them all at once instead of watching them fall by the wayside one by one.

  11. I think the logging it is another habit all in itself, Julie! Seems like a catch-22 to me if you’re not supposed to take on too many at once, having to build that habit as well only hurts your chances. 🙂

  14. Oh I know what you’re talking about, not only did I quit smoking a month ago, I also will start a new job in a week and to have any chance to survive I will have to keep strict structures and be very neat with all my papers and everything. Problem is – I’m really bad with this 🙁
    Anyway,may this list will help me avoid the common pitfalls – thanks for sharing 🙂

    Happy TT
    Julia

  17. I want to know how you can “quit” after you’ve “failed”! LOL. For me, it’s not seeing the small successes. There’s always another goal, another achievement. But I have to credit the progress I’ve made even if it LOOKS like failure.
    Does that make sense?

  18. I find I can change a whole bunch of habits at a whack if I’m undergoing a fundamental change. For instance, all my laundry and dishwashing habits are up for grabs after a move.

  21. I dunno, Jen. I took the “quit” in that last one means to quit even trying to instill the good habit or break the bad one.

    For me it’s easy to get discouraged by missing those small goals. If I can’t manage to meet the small stuff, how’s it going to ever be easier to meet the bigger ones or ever do them consistently?

    What you said makes sense though, I guess I’m just more cynical and pessimistic in the long run. I do well when I’ve got a small repeatable goal until it slides for 3 days. But the larger, less defined goals/habits are the real killers.

  22. so very true, girl. cold turkey doesn’t work for me. great !! and great site. i’ll definitely sift through it. please visit my tt!

  23. Great list. I’ll definitely use some of those tips. I’m particularly bad with #13. I fall down once and I quit.

  25. I have a bad habit about thinking I’ve already done something when in reality, I only THOUGHT I did it.

    Because I could have sworn I left my mark here already…

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