3 Simple Hacks to Build Habits That Actually Stick (No Willpower Required)
The harsh truth about goals and how to achieve them anyway
I had so many dreams ever since I was a kid:
I wanted to be a software engineer.
I wanted a big house and a cute dog.
I wanted to be physically fit.
And so on.
But unfortunately, I failed to achieve almost everything.
And that happens to all of us. We have goals we want to achieve, but it’s hard to make progress towards these goals.
And I blamed myself a lot for these failures over the years. The self-loathing was too much, and it was doing me no good. I thought there was something wrong with me, or maybe I’m just not lucky enough, but that was a lie I’ve told myself all my life.
Instead of doing the work, I was running away from it. I was living in a fantasy world, but things started to change when I understood this simple thing:
The difference between those who achieve their dreams and those who don’t often comes down to habits.
As the famous personal development author Brian Tracy said,
“An average person who develops the habit of setting clear priorities and getting important tasks completed quickly will run circles around a genius who talks a lot and makes wonderful plans but gets very little done.”
But knowing something and working on it are still two very different things.
The reality is that most days you’d want to quit. I’ve been doing a 90-day challenge and today is day 29, and I hate it.
It feels like I’m doing the same things day in and day out, but I am still doing it because it takes time to build a routine.
If you feel the same, try these tips:
The Habit Loop
The first step is understanding how habits work.
According to Stanford behavior scientist BJ Fogg, habits are made up of three components:
A cue,
A routine,
And a reward.
The cue is the trigger that kicks off the habitual behavior. It could be a time of day or a certain location.
The routine is the actual habit you want to build — like going for a run, meditating, or writing.
The reward is something that satisfies a craving and reinforces the habit loop to make it more likely to happen again in the future.
To build a new habit, you need to start by identifying a clear cue and reward.
For example, I want to write every day. And I write right after brushing my teeth in the morning. For me, the cue is brushing my teeth and sitting on my desk with my laptop.
The routine is writing. And the reward is making a big red cross on my calendar every day I write.
As Will Durant said, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
The Two-Minute Rule
Another helpful strategy is the two-minute rule from author James Clear: when starting a new habit, it should take less than two minutes to do.
The idea is that when the behavior is extremely small and painless to start with, it’s easy to get it done each day without resistance.
Over time, the habit becomes deeply ingrained and you can gradually increase the time invested.
For example, I hate to exercise. I don’t know why. But for the last month, I have worked out at least 5/7 days every week.
And I have never done it for so long at home. I had gone to the gym years ago, and I was consistent with that, but never with home workouts.
What helped me is my technique. I decided to work out for just 5 minutes every day and almost every day I end up doing 15–20 minutes.
But because the goal is so low, I don’t want to procrastinate and if some days I don’t feel like doing it; I have actually done it for just 5 minutes.
Eventually, those few minutes of work will compound into much bigger results. And that’s the goal.
Habit Stacking
One of my favourite techniques for building habits is called “habit stacking” by author SJ Scott. This involves linking your new habit to an existing one that’s already ingrained in your life.
Here’s how I’ve incorporated this in my life:
After brushing my teeth, I would workout.
After I am done with the workout, I will meditate for 10 minutes.
After taking a bath, I’ll write for half an hour.
Before I go to bed, I will do journaling and write down tasks for the next day.
And this has made the whole process of following a routine less overwhelming for me.
As Gretchen Rubin said, “What we do every day matters more than what we do once in a while.”
The Takeaway
The ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu said,
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
And the journey of self-improvement is the same. If you focus too much on the big picture, you’ll feel that it’s impossible to achieve your goals.
When I started writing, if you had told me that I’d end up writing 350+ articles and would fall in love with the process, I wouldn’t have believed you because at that time writing even one article felt like a huge task.
So, it’s always best to focus on the next small step and take the leap. To do that you need small, sustainable habits that, when repeated daily, will bring you the desired results.
So start building your transformative habits today, one tiny step at a time.
You’ve got this!
I’ll see you next week,
Sush 💪