How to Change Bad Habits, One Step at a Time! You can only know you have a bad habit by identifying it. So, the first step is identifying your bad habits. Many times, we gloss over such behaviour but one way to figure them out is to look at the future consequences of such. One such example is smoking. A smoker says “I’m not a heavy smoker. I just smoke TWO cigarettes per day and they help me relax & focus well.” Consider this: If you smoke TWO cigarettes a day for twenty years, that’s 14,600 sticks of cigarettes. Do you Think forteen thousand-six hundred cigarettes could have an impact on your lungs? Of course! In fact, the consequences may be deadly. So, when you examine your own bad habits, consider the long term implications. Be totally honest. Your life and future may be at stake. Get a pen and a jotter and write down the terrible habits that need to be addressed in your life. Examples of bad habits include the following as mentioned by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen and Les Hewitt in their book titled “ The Power of Focus. ” *Working long hours with no exercise or breaks * Not spending enough time with your children * A lack of clarity about expected outcomes, monthly targets, goals, etc * Not returning phone calls on time * Being late for meetings and appointments * Handling the mail more than once * Procrastinating on both minor and major tasks * Eating fast food meals from Monday-Friday There are so many others but I’d like to stop and tell you the other steps to changing an awful habit. 10 Steps to Changing a Bad Habit: Changing habits is possible if you commit to it. Read the following tips and get help for your transformation project. 1) Think of a replacement for the habit you want to change: There is no vacuum in nature. If you want to get rid of a bad behavior, think of a replacement for it. When Patrick Meninga (founder of thefreedomblogger) wanted to quit smoking, he took to exercising and it worked for him. Before you even quit a bad way of living, think about a replacement. If you don’t, stress or the challenges of life can cause you to relapse. 2) Don’t change two habits at once, it could be overwhelming There are cases where you have several habits you want to adjust but my advice is: take them one by one. For instance, if you want to lose weight and quit smoking at the same time, I would advise that you first stop smoking; you can then move to weight loss once you succeed with the first change. The reason is simple. Habit change is not easy. It’s going to be accompanied by challenges and stress (which are manageable if you commit to one habit change at a time). 3) Commit for a full month Experts say you need 21 days to make a new way of life permanent but I’d just say you commit to a new habit for at least 30 days. This is to enable you get the new way of life wired into your brain (so it can accept it as your new normal behaviour). 4) Be clear about the benefits of your new habit Clarity is key in behavior change. So, have a clear idea of the benefits of the adjustment and communicate same to your brain and emotions (because the emotions are also powerful in habit change). 5) Write it down Success teachers often talk about writing down your goals. They say it’s the first way of giving life to your goals. I already mentioned it but it bears repeating. Writing out any commitments you make will give clarity to both what you desire and how you intend to achieve it. 6) Tell a friend or family He may or may not be your accountability partner but just get the word out there. It helps you to stay accountable and more likely to follow through with your commitment. 7) Stay consistent Habit change, like I earlier said, is hard and you may find yourself faltering one or two times. Don’t dwell on this. Just get yourself back up and continue with the adjustment program. Don’t allow an initial setback to deprive you of the joy and benefits of change. For instance, if you want to be a prolific writer, the best way is to write, not just a few times a week, but every day. Write at the same time (preferably in the mornings) and in the same pattern to ensure your results stick. 8) Stay out of trouble If you want to lose weight and still keep junk food at home, you’re not staying out of trouble. It’s very likely you get stressed and pick up the food again, so, get rid of any thing, event or people who remind you of the old habit and are likely to get you back into it. 9) Never strive for perfection; it’s not in your nature Human beings are not perfect, so, don’t expect to become perfect overnight. Most changes you embark on could take more than a month but keep at it, knowing how beneficial it’s going to be to your career, life, business and family. 10) Do it now! There is no better time to make a switch from bad habits to good ones than now! Tomorrow might be too late (I’m sounding like a preacher now) but the truth is, the time to change is NOW and not tomorrow! Summary and Action TakeAway: Now that you know how to chase bad habits out of your life, I urge you to start acting now ! Tomorrow might be too late!
Posted on: Mon, 03 Feb 2014 16:06:46 +0000
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