Changing A Bad Habit (or making a new one)
I'm not particularly good at writing introductions to posts; just as I'm not particularly good at posting regularly (sorry to everyone who's been waiting on a post!), so let's just jump right in!
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Changing A Bad Habit (or making a new one)
A four-step guide.
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Recognise:
Recognising the fact that your current situation is not healthy, or no longer working for you, is possibly one of the most important steps in changing a part of your way of living.
WANTING to do something always makes it easier to carry it out. And once you realize you need to change something in your life, you will probably want to change it. Which in turn will make all the other steps far easier.
Environment:
Once you have recognised and identified what you are going to be changing, the next step is to change your environment. When I changed my morning routine from waking up around midday to waking up at 7 am, one of the first things I did was move my room around. Since I was now going to sleep and waking up in a different place to what I usually did, it was much easier to shift the habit of waking up late. It’s not going to be this easy for every situation, and some people will be in a situation where they can’t move their things around so easily; however, there are always little things you can do to change your environment a little, to help move out of that old mindset. Move things around to make it a bit harder to complete those not-so-good habits that you are trying to get out of. If things are still right there, and easy to grab, it’s likely that you won’t even think about it, and continue on with those habits.
Motivation:
It’s all very good and easy for me to sit here and tell you what you should be doing, but the chances of you actually carrying these things out are… relatively small. If you’re particularly passionate about changing something in your life, you may be able to do it on what information I’ve given you thus far, but here’s the magic that makes it work.
As I mentioned before, one of the things I changed recently was my sleep schedule. However, just making myself wake up earlier wouldn’t have lasted long. The key to changing something for good is motivation.
In the context of changing a bad habit, the motivation part has two steps.
The first step is to understand the reason you are undertaking this change. Perhaps it’s making you unhappy, wasting your precious time, or making you feel physically or mentally unwell.
The second step is recognising what this change will help in your life. The removal of this bad habit (or addition of a new one) could change a lot; lift your mood, help you rest more, give you time to achieve the things that you want to get done.
Start writing down the way you feel, and track your progress as you make the changes. If something starts to go wrong and you start to feel worse, look back over your notes or journal pages, and work out what you did differently, and what you can do instead.
Reward:
And if the motivation part wasn’t enough, I have one more step. The icing on the cake, if you like.
Find something positive to slot in afterwards. For me, this is going for a walk outside with my Dad, and then sitting down with my laptop to write, or sit at my desk and journal for a little while, since I suddenly had five extra hours of the morning available!
Just one thing to remember, when rewarding yourself; it may help to cement this new change in your mind, but be careful not to replace your bad habit with another. Be careful also when using food as a reward for something; as this can become complicated and a bit messy!
I know this might sound like every other “life-help” article ever, but it’s truly good advice. Try to swap your bad habit for something productive. Something that will benefit your life in a positive way, and will support your new way of thinking.
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