An easy way to break bad habits is to create some simple good habits. Many of us try to break bad habits; just as new habits can be formed, old habits can also be replaced with new small habits. Similarly, to break bad habits, we try to follow rules. Because everyone knows that nothing can be done properly without following rules. But even though everyone knows this, they don’t succeed for various reasons. They waste a lot of time doing unnecessary work or stay up late at night. They can’t break the habit even if they try.
“Smoking is also a matter of habit. If you don’t have the habit, cigarette smoke will stop your breath. And those who are used to it go crazy for this smoke.”
— Humayun Ahmed
Be it any habit—smoking or staying up late at night—conscious mind intervention is required to change it. Even when many are in the middle of an important university assignment, they feel like, “Let’s go and check Facebook for two minutes,” but when those two minutes turn into twenty minutes or even two hours, the result is a waste of valuable time.
Again, many people try to wake up early in the morning. But after waking up for a day or two, everything goes back to the way it was before. Even with an alarm, it doesn’t work. Even setting multiple alarms at the same time does not give results. Many times, we put off urgent tasks saying we will do them tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. It’s not that we don’t want to do today’s work today, but for some strange reason, it doesn’t get done.
That strange reason is nothing more than our long-standing habits. We don’t even realize how much damage our lives and careers suffer because we can’t eliminate some small habits.
Bad habits can never be abandoned easily. It is very difficult to avoid bad habits. Instead, change bad habits into positive habits.
Suppose a person has a bad habit of biting his nails. He wants to get rid of this bad habit. Now, what should he do? The person can form a good habit of cutting his nails with a nail clipper every week. The habit of cutting nails once a week replaces the bad habit. In this way, an old habit has to be changed with a new habit.
It is never possible to erase a bad habit completely. Simply put, the mind is a huge vacuum that can never be kept empty. The place where habits are stored in our brain is also like a huge vacuum. It never remains empty. When a bad habit occupies that space, if you try to get rid of it, something else fills the vacuum. Another bad habit may accumulate there.
An easy way to break a bad habit is to create some simple good habits. If someone has a bad habit of staying up late, sleeping earlier and waking up early in the morning can help overcome the bad habit through a good habit.
Motivation vs. Willpower:
Habit is the center of our life. We don’t even realize that we live with habits. Habits are involved in every aspect of our day. The fact that we wake up every morning and brush our teeth, check our mobile phones to see how many likes were on yesterday’s status, who commented, or various updates—these are all habits.
Brushing our teeth in the morning started when we were children, watching adults, and after doing it for years, it has become a habit. You may have noticed that many people take their mobile phones out of their pockets again and again and turn them on and off for no reason—this is also a habit. Many habits are added to our lives from childhood to adulthood.
But changing habits is more difficult in adulthood than in childhood.
We often start changing habits by being motivated in various ways, but after a short time, everything returns to its previous state. Here is an explanation of why this happens.
In fact, to create a good habit or eliminate a bad habit, willpower is needed more than motivation or inspiration. Willpower is the strength to force yourself to do something even if you don’t want to. Not everyone has this power, or you can’t exert much willpower at first. You have to increase this power little by little. It is very important to increase your willpower gradually to eliminate bad habits or create good habits.
Don’t change habits all at once: Work on small habits
If you set a huge target to change habits at first, your willpower will not work. For example, if you set a target of doing 100 push-ups on the first day of bodybuilding, it will be difficult to do. Or if you aim to meditate for 30 minutes on the first day, the chances of doing it are very low.
When you can’t meet your goal on the first day, your confidence will be shaken, and you will lose interest in continuing. So what’s the solution?
The best solution to these problems is ‘mini habits.’ If you want to easily adopt any new habit or eliminate a bad habit, start with a mini habit. Use your willpower in small increments.
Suppose your goal is to run for an hour every day. Start with 5 to 10 minutes. Running for five to ten minutes requires very little willpower. It won’t feel that difficult. Again, suppose your goal is to do 100 push-ups every day. Start with 5 on the first day! It’s just a matter of 10 seconds.
“Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength” is a great book about willpower written by Roy Baumeister and John Tierney. According to them, “Each day, humans have a limited supply of willpower.” This means that the amount of willpower we can exert depends on the supply of willpower. They also say:
“Willpower is humans’ greatest strength, but the best strategy is not to rely on it in all situations. Save it for emergencies.”
If you want to meditate for half an hour every day, just 1 minute on the first day will do. After a few days, it will increase on its own. But don’t jump from 1 minute to 1 hour on the second day. Gradually increase the time and amount.
Increase from 1 minute to 2 minutes, then 3 minutes. Don’t jump from 5 push-ups to 20 at once. Increase gradually from 5 to 6, then 7, 8.
If you want to wake up at 5 am, don’t try to wake up that early at first. It’s better to start at 7 am. After a few days, try waking up 15 minutes earlier. Reduce the time by 15 minutes every few days. Hopefully, waking up at 5 am will become a habit within a month or a month and a half.
If you try to do it all at once, it will feel like a burden within a few days. So, it’s better to make the habit permanent gradually rather than trying to do it all at once. By practicing these mini habits, they will gradually become your regular habits, and you will be able to perform the tasks much more easily.
Brain Fact : A hug of just 20 seconds increases the release of the hormone oxytocin in a woman’s brain many times. Within these 20 seconds, a woman can gauge the loyalty of the man hugging her.