Learn How to Eliminate Your Bad Habits

It has been said that human beings are ‘Creatures of Habit’. Habits are routines of behaviors that occur outside of conscious awareness. Many habits are helpful, in that they help you to manage your time, and complete important and routine everyday tasks.

Do you have a habit you would like to eliminate? Is your habit your servant or your master? Are you aware that ultimately, your habits determine your future!

No matter what you might long for in life, you don’t just drift along into the life you desire, you have to create what you want by taking action in the direction of your goals.

Ask your self some questions about the habits you have developed. Some will be helpful habits, in that they are consistent with your values, while others habits are unhelpful and do not serve your life goals.

Breaking a habit involves will power! Habits differ from addictions because they can be controlled by the will, whereas addictions are negative behaviors that are no longer under the control of the will. Many people hang on to unhelpful habits because they meet an important emotional need in the form of a Reward. Habits are not innate; rather they are learned and influenced by the environment by a process known as Reinforcement (reward). Think about the reward you derive from the habit you wish to eliminate. Do you have the will power to give this up and make a change?

Identify one unhelpful habit in your life and ask yourself; What keeps it going? Does it meet a social or emotional need in you? How does this habit impact on your life? Does it affect your sense of the future? How would you like it to be different? In what way would your life be different if you could break free of this unhelpful habit?

Studies have shown that in order to break free of unhelpful habits it is necessary to Replace them with habits that promote and serve your goals.

Can you think of a helpful habit you could develop so that you can replace your unhelpful habit?

The findings of psychological research demonstrate that habits develop through repetition, with very little or no thought involved.

So, we know that habits become automatic through consistent repetition and reward. This applies to both helpful and unhelpful habits, whatever it is you repeat and reward in a consistent way for 30 days will become a new habit, whether it is helpful or unhelpful, good or bad!

Understanding the factors that influence the formation of habits will help you to apply them to creating the habits you want to develop; habits that serve your goals.

If you don’t set a baseline standard for what you will accept in life, you will find it easy to slip into behaviors, attitudes or quality of life that falls far below what you deserve.

If you are ready to eliminate an unwanted habit you will find some guidelines below.

• When attempting to eliminate an unwanted habit, it is much easier to deal with one habit at a time, so that you do not set yourself up for failure by taking on too much at once.
• Write down a start date and give yourself a 30 day time frame to replace an unwanted habit with a one that you would like to develop.
• Write down your goals and tell others about your intentions, this will help you to take responsibility for your decision and make you accountable to yourself for follow-through.  
• List the pros and cons of eliminating your unwanted habit; this will help you to strengthen your motivation, by focusing on what you want and what you don’t want in your life.
• Be sure to find out what your triggers are. All habits have a trigger point; it may be time of day, or other context, which acts as a trigger for you to exercise your unwanted habit. For instance; do you eat in the context of being hungry or when you see food?!
• Use self-talk to help you cope with temptation. Access support from others who believe you can do it and are not likely to sabotage your progress.
• Identify the obstacles that might get in the way of you reaching your goal. Make a plan so that you can manage blips and setbacks to progress. Expect blips as part of the process and don’t give up!
• Use your pros and cons list to help you to stay motivated on a daily basis, add pictures or photographs as visual aids to prompt you to stay on target.

On your ‘start day’, consistently replace the unhelpful habit with the helpful one you have chosen. Remember that repetition and rehearsal establishes a new pattern, so stick with it! Change the environment so that the relationship between your trigger and your response is disrupted. Be consistent!

Follow these instructions for 30 days minimum and then review your progress. If you have a blip, look for the trigger, and plan to be more vigilant next time it occurs.

Make your habits your servants; do not allow unwanted habits to prevent you from living your dreams! You are able to choose, and you have the power to make change happen in your life, no-one else does. If it is important to you, it can be overcome. Ultimately, it is what you DO that matters in life. Helpful habits lead to positive futures.

Take Action!

Use these tips to help you identify problem behaviour, move forward and stay on track.

What will you be doing differently 30 days from now?
Write it down here:
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

If someone was watching you what would they be noticing about you?
Write it down here:
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Now live what you have described, live it consistently every day
for 30 days!

If you would like further information on Habit Formation or elimination of unhelpful habits, here are some useful reading suggestions:

The Habit Change Workbook; How to break bad habits and form good ones by J Claiborn.

Habitually Great: Master your habits, own your destiny by Mark Weinstein.

Achieve your full potential! Work with a Business and Life Management Coach with over 20 years’ experience empowering people to attain self-defined success in their professional & personal lives. Book a complimentary session at http://www.denisedema.com to get started today!

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Learn To Increase Your Willpower

Our ability to change habits is an important part of cultivating a healthy and happy life, but there are many different factors to consider when trying to change a habit. 

One of the best things to do is identify your habit loops. This means finding the “cue-routine-reward” that fuels your habits, and then trying to change your habit by changing the way you respond to cues in your environment, or using different rewards to reinforce a new course of action.

However, understanding the structure of your habits won’t always be enough to modify your behaviors. There is an element of willpower that plays a key role in all habit change. 

Willpower is the self-discipline to do something even if you don’t have a lot of motivation to do it.

For example, those who have strong willpower will be able to resist a slice of cake or push themselves to go to the gym, while a person with less willpower will find it more difficult to do these things if they aren’t already used to them.

Recently there has been a good amount of research on how we can maximize our willpower when changing habits. Here are the important findings:

 • Willpower is a limited resource that needs to be used wisely. When researchers have participants resist eating a cookie, they perform worse on a difficult puzzle afterwards. That’s because when we exercise our willpower at one task, we have less willpower to dedicate to another task. Therefore, it’s best to only focus on changing one major habit at a time. If you spread yourself too thin, by trying to change too much about your life at once, it’s very likely that you will get tired faster and give up quicker on your goals.

• Willpower can be strengthened like a muscle. While it’s true that it’s limited, we can build upon our long-term capacity by actively exercising our willpower more often. Practice by changing small habits first – like switching soda with water, or just going out for a walk every morning – and then you can move onto bigger habits once you strengthen your willpower and motivation. It’s just like exercising any other muscle. You can’t expect to go into the gym and bench press 200 lbs, but if you work at it overtime then maybe one day you will. Our willpower works the same way.

• Believing you have more willpower makes you push yourself harder. A study published in Psychological Science found that students could fight off taking a break from studying simply by having the mindset that they can go longer. When motivating ourselves to change habits, it’s important to remember that our attitude and beliefs play a crucial role. If you believe that you can achieve something, you’re more likely to push yourself and go that extra mile. But when you believe your willpower is weak, you’re more likely to settle for less.

• Practice taking a step back. One of the best ways to disconnect from our routines and change our behavior is to practice a short STOP meditation. This is when we step back from what we are doing in the moment and reflect on our current mindset. Willpower requires focus and awareness. If you go about your day unconsciously, without ever second-guessing yourself, then you aren’t exercising very much of your willpower and potential.

• Once you build a new habit, you can concentrate your willpower on other new habits. Habits are often characterized by the fact that they are routine and automatic. When you first learned how to tie your shoes, it may have taken a lot of effort and concentration. Now that you’ve practiced it so many times, it’s second-nature to you – and therefore it takes practically no willpower or energy at all. In the same way, once we build a new habit we no longer need as much willpower to do it, so we can begin focusing that willpower on adopting new behaviors. 

Psychologists admit that some people are probably born with more willpower than others. However, it’s good to know that we can improve our willpower in various ways by exercising it more.

Improve your will power and work with a Business and Life Management Coach with over 20 years’ experience empowering people to attain self-defined success in their professional & personal lives. Book a complimentary session at http://www.denisedema.com  to start achieving your full potential today.

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Choices

Start Choosing the Best Environment for Success

Success in any area of life never happens in a complete vacuum. Often it is just as much dependent on an individual’s will-power and intelligence as it is on their environment and outside circumstances.

To find happiness and success, you therefore need to pay attention and take some control over the type of environments you are surrounding yourself in on a daily basis; even the strongest and brightest of minds will find it difficult to achieve their goals if they are in a completely wrong environment for them. This is because every aspect of your external life has some influence over your internal thoughts and behaviors, especially the people you surround yourself with on a daily basis, and the type of places where you spend most of your time.

Time to look at the people you surround yourself with…..

The first main aspect of our environment that influences our success is the people we surround ourselves with on a daily basis. 

For example, a recent study published in a 2013 issue of Psychological Science found that surrounding yourself with friends who are more self-disciplined can also help you become more self-disciplined. This is just one of many examples of how our social network can have an influence over our own behavior and goal-seeking.

It fits well with other research that shows if you hang around people who are obese and unhealthy, it’s more likely you will become obese and unhealthy. And if you hang around with people who are lazy and don’t study for class, it’s likely you’ll end up with similar grades as them too. More and more scientific evidence is beginning to show that we become a reflection of the types of people we hang out with the most. This social influence affects every area of our lives: at home, at work, at school, at a party, or wherever.

So take a moment to think about some of your own personal goals and values. Are there any people in your life who are currently holding you back from achieving them? Be honest. Instead of spending time with people who make you hate life and make you want to give up, spend time with people who make you love life and motivate you to improve yourself for the better. 

That to me is one of the most important characteristics in a healthy relationship. It’s also essential to achieving success. If you have the right people in your life, it’ll be easy to find that extra boost of support when you really need it.

Think about the places you spend your time at……

The second main aspect of our environment that influences our success is the places we spend most of our time at.

For example, one important factor that has shown to increase productivity and happiness is giving people some freedom to design their own workplace. Taking ownership over where you spend your time allows you to choose an environment that motivates and inspires you. A good environment for success should keep your senses stimulated and awake while you work on your goals, while not being too distracting. 

For example, one specific thing you could do is put plants or a fish tank in your office, gym, or workplace to surround yourself with nature more. There have been countless studies showing how exposing ourselves to nature can improve focus, minimize stress, and boost cognitive ability.

Another thing you can do is decorate your workspace with motivational posters and quotes. These can be great resources to have around the office when you need something to lift your mood. Find images that are visually appealing to you, with designs and colors that make you feel good and set the right tone for you and your goals.

Often when working for large organizations we can lose a sense of our personal identity. Your office is usually the one place you have some freedom to express yourself, so create a work environment that works for you – something that reflects some of your own values and interests, and something that motivates and inspires you.

Try changing your workspace around every few months or so to keep it fresh and interesting. On the surface it may not seem like a big deal, but remember this is the place you work at everyday, so it’s going to have an influence on your success and inspiration whether you realize it or not. You might as well make it as positive as possible.

It’s about choosing an environment that brings out the best in you……..

At the end of the day, you can’t meet your full potential for success unless you find an environment that brings out the very best in you. Try to become more aware of the people and places you interact with on a daily basis. Are they encouraging your success or discouraging it? How can you make some changes to your environment so that it better serves you and your goals?

Achieve your full potential and work with a Business and Life Management Coach who has over 20 years’ experience empowering individuals, executives and business owners to attain self-defined success in their professional & personal lives. Book a complimentary session at http://www.denisedema.com