Day 13 of journaling every day! In order to make the types of long term changes that will help us reach our goals, we need to change our habits or start adapting new ones. Over the next few days, we will examine our current habits and think about actionable ways to change them and implement new habits. I first encountered the definition of habit as cue, routine/behavior, and reward when I read The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg for a class in college. Cue triggers the behavior. Duhigg argues that most cues fall into these categories: - Location - Time - Emotional State - Other People - Immediately preceding action Routine/Behavior is the good or bad habit we are trying to identify. Reward is the reason we keep coming back to this habit. The example Duhigg gives in his book is his daily afternoon cookie. For his goal of loosing weight, he wants to cut out the cookie, but cold-turkey isn't working. The cue turns out to be the time of day. The routine/behavior he wants to change is getting up from his desk to get and eat a cookie. Initially he suspects sugar or the snack to be the reward, but he realizes the more important reward is actually the break and socializing that getting up to get the cookie resulted in. We often think about what we need to change and what we want to do differently to reach our goals but today I would like us to focus on the positive and take a look at our good habits and why they work. I recommend taking the first third of however much time you are dedicating to writing today and listing out your good habits. Then take the final two thirds of your time to guess at the cue, behavior, and reward for each. Take 5-15 minutes and write about What are your good habits? List at least 3 and identify the cue that triggers the habit, the behavior, and the reward you get. Habits by their very definition are unthinking behaviors. I hope that by examining them, we are able to leverage our existing habits and build new habits that serve us. #timetosoar24 You can subscribe to my emailed prompts and read my reflections here: https://allthejoyfulthings.beehiiv.com/

Posted by laurawaltje at 2024-01-13 20:11:52 UTC