Habits - Maintaining Momentum
Image credit: www.jamesclear.com
When integrating a new habit, you need to repeat the action enough times for the habit loop to “groove”. In the first and second week of a new habit, motivation and energy is high and it can seem easy to maintain momentum. But in many people, motivation and inspiration wanes after about 3 weeks, and then it is necessary to develop what is called discipline to make sure the action continues.
Discipline is what keeps the habit going. This is where habits are truly formed, from the repetition of the action no matter how enthusiastic you are. Research shows that it takes on average 66 days to form a habit and for it to become almost second nature, although is variable from person to person.
But doing the actions in the first place isn’t often the challenge, maintaining your actions over time is.
A great way to think of maintaining your habits is to look at the 1st law of physics, the Law of Inertia:
“An object at rest will stay at rest, as long as nothing pushes or pulls on it. An object in motion will stay in motion, until something pushes or pulls on it.”
The principle behind this law is that for an object to start moving it requires a significant amount more energy to begin it moving in comparison to the energy it takes to continue moving. This is also relevant to behaviour.
Apply this law to your habits as well, if you have built a system that makes it easy to keep going it will feel harder and involve more effort to stop. And it is a reminder that if you stop, it will take much more effort to begin again.
So, if you can overcome the three-week mark of a new habit, and build the discipline to maintain momentum then this is a key that the habit will become a long term one.
How to push past the three-week mark (or any time your motivation wanes) and continuing your habits:
Schedule your habits
When actions have time allocated to them, they are much more likely to get done
Scheduling your habits reminds you when you will do your action
Habit loops are very easily activated when habits are done at similar times of the day
Setting a schedule for when you do your habits helps them to become more activated by the time
It is harder to call and cancel an appointment than to just show up
Hire or book in with someone for accountability (fitness class, meal prep, meet a friend at the gym)
Make it easy to start your habits
Reduce the resistance to start your habit
Make it so easy to start, you can’t say no
Take a few minutes to prepare in advance before the habit occurs
Leave your gym clothes and shoes ready for the morning
Prepare your meals so that they are ready to eat
Leave out your headphone and pillow for meditation
Use the Goldilocks principle with your habits
The sweet spot for habits is just enough challenge to push you, but easy enough to complete. If a habit is much too hard, it will be very hard to maintain. If it is too easy, it doesn’t challenge you.
Update your habits as they get easy. Increase the difficulty within your capability either in frequency, duration or effort if you are no longer finding your habit challenging. (like training 2x a week and increasing to 3x a week, meditating for 15 minutes instead of 5, preparing more recipes for lunch and dinners at meal prep)
Or if you are happy with your habit in the Goldilocks principle, you might want to start integrating a new habit to challenge yourself
Don’t change too many habits at once
Choose to be aware of your energy and how much you can dedicate to a new habit. Too many habit changes is hard to distribute energy so you may burn out and end up doing none!
Work on “bang for buck” habits that have a big return for effort. Strength Training, meal prep, sleep duration are all going to have big follow on effects to your body composition, mood, eating habits if you integrate them first, rather than smaller habits.
Complete your reflection every week to maintain perspective
Continue to remind yourself and check your progress each week to course-correct back to your habits
Hopefully this post helps keep you on track towards being the most powherful version of you!