The Habit Remedy
We’re often told that if we want to make changes in our life then we need to think big and create big goals for ourselves, but what if all it took was a tiny change to our daily routine.
According to James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, one of my personal favorite books, this is all you need to do.
“It is so easy to overestimate the importance of one defining moment and underestimate the value of making small improvements on a daily basis. Too often, we convince ourselves that massive success requires massive action.”
— James Clear in Atomic Habits
Let’s say we have an imaginary savings account and let’s say that the compound interest of this savings account is 1% per day. It might seem like nothing but if we work the math out we will see that after one year the amount of money in this savings account will have multiplied, almost 38 times more valuable than it was one year before. Now, let’s say this same bank is a crook and every day they might take 1% of your money. Again, this might seem marginal, but if see how much money you have left in the bank after one year, you only have 2% of what you put in at the beginning. How this relates to habits is that if you improve just a little each day, after a period of time you will have improved much more than you expected yourself to. This is something that is called The One Percent Rule.
Most people think that that success is linear but it is actually a curve. There is an initial area where we are doing worse than we expected to and this is where a lot of people quit trying initially but that’s a mistake. Those people are missing what comes after that inital area, which is where the real improving starts.
But to improve each day you need some kind of way to make sure that you actually do what you want to. Introducing the habit
A habit is a routine or behavior that is performed regularly — and, in many cases, automatically.
Goals vs. Systems
James says that instead of focusing on goals we should focus on systems. For example what if I set a goal to have a clean room and let’s say that one day I just happen to have the motivation to do it, that might clean my room once but if we don’t actually change the fundamental systems that led to the room getting messy in the first place, it will just be messy again in a few days. This is why instead of focusing on setting goals we should be focusing on developing systems.
Outcome Based vs Identity Based
James also says that we need to create habits based on identity rather than outcome. What does this mean?
The three layers of changing your habits are:
- Changing your outcomes
- Changing your process
- Changing your identity
Outcomes are about what you get. Processes are about what you do. Identity is about what you believe. True behavior change is identity change. You might start a habit because of motivation, but the only reason you’ll stick with one is that it becomes part of your identity. Anyone can convince themselves to visit the gym or eat healthy once or twice, but if you don’t shift the belief behind the behavior, then it is hard to stick with long-term changes.
— James Clear in Atomic Habits
What James is saying is that to truly change your habits, instead of saying:
“I am trying to lose weight so I am exercising and eating healthy”
Say this: “I am a healthy person so I excercise and eat healthy”
This is changing your identity.
The Four Step Process
James has a four step process to habits.
Cue, Craving, Response, Reward
The Cue: The cue is a piece of information in your brain that predicts a reward, and in turn, triggers a specific action
The Craving: We have no reason to act if we do not have motivation. The craving is that motivational force that drives the habit. The craving is wanting the reward
The Response: The response is the action that you do. This is essentially the habit you are performing
The Reward: The whole reason you did the habit was the reward at the end. The cue is about noticing the reward. The reason you had the craving is because you wanted the reward.
The reward relates to what James calls The Cardinal Rule of Behavior Change
The Cardinal Rule of Behavior Change states:
What is rewarded is repeated; what is punished is avoided
There is a problem with this though.
If you do a good job at work, you’ll get a paycheck in a few weeks. If you exercise today, perhaps you won’t be overweight next year. If you save money now, maybe you’ll have enough for retirement decades from now.
— James Clear in Atomic Habits
This means that a lot of the time, the reward is delayed from the actual habit. But if we repeat what is rewarded, then why is it that, for example, we think of excercise as a hassle. We get the reward of being fit, right?
Well, there is one thing missing. We do get the reward, but after a while. That is the key thing. *In the moment,* all we get from excercising is tiredness, sweat, and maybe some aching. There is nothing there that people think of as a reward. This is why people don’t like to excercise. Later in the book James updates the cardinal rule to this:
What is immediately rewarded is repeated, what is immediately punished is avoided.
The Four Fundamental Rules of Behavior Change
On top of the Cardinal Rule, James has four rules he likes to call The Four Fundamental Rules of Behavior Change
1. Make it obvious
2. Make it attractive
3. Make it easy
4. Make it satisfying
The First Rule — Make It Obvious
An implementation intention sweeps away foggy notions like “I want to work out more” or “I want to be more productive” or “I should vote” and transforms them into a concrete plan of action. One thing that we can do is create a habit chain. We can say something like this:
After I do [CURRENT HABIT] I will do [NEW HABIT]
It is easier to associate a new habit with a new context than to build a new habit in the face of competing cues. It can be difficult to go to bed early if you watch television in your bedroom each night
— James Clear in Atomic Habits
Essentially what James is saying is that every habit should have a home.
The Second Rule — Make It Attractive
Making habits attractive makes it easier to follow them. One way we can do this is making whatever we want to do something that we *really want* to do. Let’s say that after every session at the gym, I go to the spa. This immediatly makes going to the gym attractive.
The Third Rule — Make it Easy
The main idea here is to take whatever we want to do and try to reduce the friction of doing it. This means that the habit is fundementally easier to do and this means we are most likely to redo it
The Fourth and Final Rule — Make it Satisfying
We get short bursts of dopamine when we do something immediatly satisfying like binging that new Netflix show or scrolling mindlessly through Facebook. Because of this, we are more likely to repeat these habits, which is basically what the Cardinal Rule says. So, what do we do to give non-immediatly satisfying tasks habits?
James says that we should chain some kind of instant gratification to every non-satisfying tasks that we want to turn into a habit.
Summary
Overall, I recommend Atomic Habits because of the way it blends in some practical tips with powerful stories that align with those tips. I, personally have been trying to fix my habits for years and this book helped me a great deal.
