Creatures of Habit or Creators of Habit

Company
Jun 2014

About 90% of our behavior is habitual. That sounds crazy to me! I thought I was spontaneous and creative!

But now that you think about it, it makes sense right? We get up in the morning, go about our morning routine, go to work, come home, take care of things around the house in the evenings, have certain days where to work or run errands or clean the house. We twirl our hair or bite our nails or always leave the remaining time left on the microwave (my old roommate used to hate when I did that!). We order the same thing at coffee shops and restaurants, engage in the same social activities, keep schedules, and watch the same TV shows. We are creatures of habit. We do the same things every day because routine makes us feel comfortable.

This is not a bad thing necessarily. Comfort is a positive feeling, and we want to embrace positive feelings! If a habit you hold helps you accomplish something or improves your life (or is neutral and doesn’t have an effect either way) then keep it! However, if a habit leaves you feeling unsatisfied, run down, in a rut, or any kind of negative emotions, it is time to evaluate that habit, and prepare to change it. Your habits determine your future outcomes.

We create or often fall into habits professionally, personally, and relationally. Let’s talk about habits you want to change- ones that do not serve you well or contribute to your success. Once we identify them, choose one from the list, and begin to implement a new habit!

A limiting habit may be one of the following:

Procrastinating
Mis-managing your money or impulse buying
Rushing through a project
Showing up late to meetings
Not drinking enough water
Drinking too much wine (as if there is any such thing)
Eating too much fast food or not enough fruits and veggies
Oversleeping and consequently rushing out the door stressed
Letting receivables go overdue
Taking over a conversation instead of listening

Once you choose a limiting habit, your challenge is to identify a new habit to take its place. When I did this exercise, I picked my bad habit of always having an electronic device in my hand or within my reach. I would hear a notification, and immediately stop whatever I was doing to read it or respond to it. This was a limiting habit for me because I was not spending my free time with my children, and I was not being present in whatever activity I was participating in at the time. I didn’t want my kids to remember
growing up with the image of mom’s iPhone glued to her hand. And I didn’t want to be constantly interrupted by notifications when I was trying to focus on finishing a project before a deadline.

If you have chosen your habit that you want to change, and identified what you would like your new more constructive habit to be, now it’s time to come up with a strategy.

How do you make your new habit a habit?
What activities will you engage that helps you?
What will motivate you to keep up with your new habit?

Using my previous example of spending free time away from electronic devices, I did a couple of things. When I left the country, I cancelled my cell phone plan, only allowing to use it where there is Wi-Fi connection. I also rearranged my work schedule so that when my kids are not doing school work (we home school) or having free play, I can spend more time with them. I began changing my schedule immediately, even though it took some time to get into the swing of my new habit, but we are all much happier for it.

I read in a book by Jack Canfield that changing one habit every 13 weeks (or 1 new habit per quarter) will help you ensure that you don’t overwhelm yourself. Also by practicing one new habit for 13 weeks, you master it for life. Doing this for 5 years will render 20 new more productive habits, which will in turn, transform your health, your relationships and your business life.

What habit would you like to develop for a more successful lifestyle? We would love to hear from you in the comments below.

“Let go of your old tired habits and plant new habits in fertile soil.” -Harley King

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Creatures of Habit or Creators of Habit?

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