You must have noticed how some people just seem to have the knack of getting things done. They will say something like, ‘I am going to start exercising next year’, and they do! Yet when you try, it’s another story.
You stick to it for a bit and then somehow it all falls flat. It can very easily make you discouraged and frustrated. You need to develop good habits that stick, to motivate you. Look at these helpful tips and apply them to see how you fare:
Start Small
Most people want to plunge in at the deep end and change things overnight, but if you want to be successful, it is best to start small and build up because sustaining positive habit does take a lot of willpower. Research shows that willpower is like a muscle, once you use it, it gets tired, and when it’s tired it wants to stop.
The solution is to start small without using too much willpower. So if its exercising we’re talking about, instead of plunging into 50 pushups a day, start with five. Always establish your habit behavior first, not increasing the amounts until what you have started becomes a natural part of you.
Get Attached to Your Good Habit
Maybe you’ve started a project at the office and worked hard on it. You kind of don’t want to let it go because you think of it as ‘yours’. But we can use this mindset to our advantage, as a visual reminder of the investment you have made in your good habit.
It’s a good idea to get a calendar, with a marker next to it, marking the date you started and watching its progress – with the intention of never breaking the chain.
Are Your Intentions Clear?
Being serious about your new positive habits means cutting out non-serious intentions. Research, once again, shows that you are much more likely to follow through if you have thought through your plans beforehand and you know exactly what you will do and when.
It’s no good saying, ‘I think I will exercise 3 times a week’. You have to actually start doing it, otherwise, you won’t cut it.
Celebrate Wins
When you are managing yourself well with your positive habits, reward yourself. Rewarding yourself releases good-feeling chemicals in the brain, feelings of pride and pleasure. It empowers you to carry on with your good habits and create bigger wins in the future.
Create Your Own Environment
Many times, our environment is what drives our behavior. Create your environment and shape it to support your positive habits. Each of your new habits will require energy to get it done and the more energy and action need to follow it through causes a person to be less likely to follow through with it.
Maybe, instead of finishing a book, you rather watch TV. Now place your book where the TV is and move the TV to another room. Get the drift? It’s creating the right environment so you can promote the change.
Supporters Will Support You
People whom you live with or whom you come into contact daily with can impact on your behavior a lot. For instance, if your best friend becomes obese, you increase the risk of becoming obese yourself by as much as 57%!
Research and experience show us that we kind of feel the same way and even act sometimes the same as the people we spend a lot of time with. That means you need to be with the same kind of people who think like you.
If you want positive things to happen in your life, you can’t surround yourself with pessimists. You need positive people around you who make you feel positive and act positively.
Be Accountable
Unfortunately, 99% of people who set audacious goals don’t execute them because they don’t plan them out. You can’t be accountable for positive changes and habits if you haven’t thought, planned and put them into action.
A goal without consequences is just wishful thinking. You need to make positive goals and put stakes on your new habits to hold yourself accountable.
Setting positive goals, and accomplishing them requires energy, commitment, and discipline, plus some really hard work. Do you have what it takes?