Habits Are Hard – Make (and Break) Them Anyway

I have a confession to make. After my last post filled with resolutions and good intentions, I really struggled to be motivated and productive. While I had cast a vision I was committed to, something was getting in the way: bad habits.

I’d struggled with some of those bad habits for awhile, and others got worse during my extended holiday break. After a few days of bumming myself out, I finally came up with a plan to get a handle on them. It’s a work in progress, but I feel better about myself now than a week ago.

Routines Versus Habits

I’m good at routines. Spontaneity stresses me out, so it’s in my nature to structure my day. I still act like I have a traditional job. I set an alarm every morning, even if it doesn’t go off as early as it did when I had a traditional job. I dress in business casual clothes. I complete a repeated set of tasks. Then I take my packed lunch and go to my coworking space, where I stay until 5 or 5:30. Every Monday through Friday.

I’m good at that routine because I want to be following it, and I know that I need structure and consistency in order to achieve my goals and get my book published. But that routine is made up of lots of little habits that can make or break my effectiveness. While many of them help me succeed, a few of them don’t.

It’s those habits–good and bad–that affect my focus and time management, and ultimately, whether every day feels like a success or a failure.

I need healthy habits to make the most of my routine instead of just going through the motions. If you’re struggling to achieve your goals and feel like you’re not making the most of your days, habits may be part of your problem.

Confronting My Bad Habits

Bad habits aren’t nearly as sexy as Ed Sheeran makes them seem.

I have plenty of bad habits that I’d like to change, especially around procrastination and wasting time. I am perpetually 5 to 15 minutes late, and that’s gotten worse since I left my job and rarely have anyone to hold me accountable.

But at the start of this year, the habit that was really getting me down was my tendency to fall asleep on the couch.

For as long as I remember, I’ve had unhealthy sleep habits. I love sleep, but I don’t do it enough–partially because I’m too busy to rest, partially because I’m a night owl by nature.

When I was younger, I could stay up until 2 am, no sweat. In high school I piled endless extra curriculars on top of a full slate of honors and AP classes by staying up really late every night. By senior year I was miserable, and that was probably largely why. High school drama seems extra world ending when you’re only sleeping 6 hours a night but scientists believe you need 8-10. My sleep deficit wasn’t doing anyone any favors, especially me, although it did get me into a great college. And so began my soul-crushing struggle with the hustle culture.

I realized this was a problem when a college friend pointed out to me that I always answered the question, “How are you?” with some variation of “Tired.” Oof. That was a habit I worked to break pretty quickly, I tell you! But even though I stopped broadcasting how exhausted I was, I didn’t actually start sleeping more.

There was a year where another friend and I endeavored to conquer our sizeable sleep deficits together. We would make sleep pacts about the minimum hours we were both going to sleep, and then guilt each other into holding to that. I shudder at it now, but I’m pretty sure the baseline number was five. “We’re both going to sleep at least 5 hours, no matter what. Come on. I know we can do it.”

Yikes. Yikes. Yikes.

All this to say … I haven’t slept enough since I was a kid. I actually sleep more now than I have at any point in my adult life. It helps when you get to decide when you’re going to wake up. But what I’ve never been able to manage is going to bed at a reasonable hour.

But lately, my occasional tendency to fall asleep on my couch at midnight and wake up to my cat pawing at my face at 3 am became a brand new, happening-every-night-for-a-week-and-a-half, gosh-I-don’t-want-this-to-be-my-life-now habit.

As as I returned to my workspace in the new year grumpy and stiff and unfocused, I knew I needed to stop this before it became any more engrained.

Breaking The Habit

How does one break a habit? (Besides cuing a little Linkin Park? Sorry – there are apparently several fun songs about habits.)

Well, first I beat myself up a bit. Why am I sleeping on my couch when I’m on break? I should be well rested. And when I get tired, I should just go to bed. Even if I was technically getting a decent amount of sleep, if half of it was curled on the couch with all the lights on, that probably wasn’t very high quality sleep, and that’s why I felt so exhausted in the morning, right? All I have to do is not sleep on the couch, and everything will be fine.

Anyone want to guess how that worked out?

The crazy thing is, every night, there were a couple of minutes when I knew I should get up and move to my bedroom–but I didn’t. I felt myself getting really sleepy. I turned off the TV. And then, instead of facing the short walk to the bedroom, even though I knew that’s what was good for me, I turned over and closed my eyes. Then bam–unconscious for 2, 3, even 4 hours.

And every night I woke up annoyed at myself.

The next thing I did, after beating myself up didn’t work, was tell a few close friends that I was struggling with this. Remember how I want people to think well of me? I figured broadcasting my failure might galvanize me into some better behaviors.

It didn’t work immediately. But after a few similar conversations, it did give me the resolve to come up with a plan.

Reward Yourself For Good Behavior

Would you rather be rewarded if you’re good or punished if you’re bad?

I’m definitely in camp number one. Since self-flagellation wasn’t working, and living with the consequences hadn’t swayed me enough to make a change, I decided to come up with a reward system to see if that would motivate me.

Spoiler alert: it’s been a week and a half and it’s working so far!

At heart, I’m still the girl who displayed all the stickers she got on her calculus tests on her calculator case. There’s something about a bright and shiny bit of adhesive that just screams, “Good job!” (sometimes literally).

I also still have a paper calendar in my bedroom, like the terrible millennial I am who has not fully accepted how much the world has changed since those days in high school calculus.

I decided to use stickers on my calendar to track every night I didn’t fall asleep on the couch. After seven consecutive stickers, I get a small reward. An ice cream cone, a bagel sandwich, maybe a new book. After 4 successful weeks, I’ll get a bigger reward. Maybe another pair of boots which I absolutely don’t need but still want anyway.

And then, to give myself a little extra push, I went back to one of the friends I’d complained to, and asked her to text me every once and awhile to see if I was still sleeping on the couch.

Stacking Habits

The thing that everyone says about habits is it takes time to make them, though there isn’t a consensus on how long, exactly.

I’ve decided that I’m going to give myself three months to focus not falling asleep on the couch. But, presuming it’s going well after a month, I’m going to stack in another behavior. In order to get myself to bed earlier, I will turn off my computer and put away my phone by 9:30 each night.

Presuming that goes well, after another month I will track how often I actually get to sleep by a certain time. I’m not quite ready to commit to when that time will be. But it ought to be 11 o’clock.

If all goes well, in three months I should have three well engrained sleep habits.

After that, I can tackle a few of my morning bad habits, which should be at least somewhat improved by all the better quality sleep I’ll be getting by going to bed on time.

Resolve. Reward. Accountability.

Truth be told, I’m pretty excited about this process, which is a very important first step. Just like I’m not going to keep a resolution I begrudgingly made, I’ve failed at habit formation in the past because I wasn’t actually all that dedicated.

This time I’m excited about rewarding myself. I’m excited about achieving something. And I’m also excited about replacing some bad habits with healthy ones that will help improve my daily life.

The first night after I put my plan in action, I still felt tired when I turned off the TV. But I fought through the tiredness and forced myself to get up because I wanted that sticker, and I wanted the reward that would come after I collected 7 stickers.

Every day since I’ve forced myself to get up. But after a few days, it wasn’t nearly as difficult. Honestly, I don’t think it’s going to take 3 months to make this habit stick, but I do think the other habits I’m going to stack in with it will be harder. But I bet after a month of success, I’ll be confident enough to follow through.

Is there a habit that’s getting in your way, or something you want to start doing to make yourself happier or more successful?

Why not try this three step approach.

• Resolve: What do you really want to start doing, stop doing, or change? Why is this important to you? What are the consequences if you don’t make or break this habit? Start with something that really evokes some emotion in you.
• Reward: How can you reward yourself for a job well done? Stickers may not be your thing. There are lots of habit tracking apps, if you want to go the techie route. The important part is you want whatever the reward will be, and you commit to only treating yourself if you make progress on your habit. You can set your own rules about how often you’re allowed to stumble. If being too strict will make you give up before you see results, allow yourself a certain number of mulligans. But don’t be too lenient that you’re not making any progress. And be sure your reward isn’t starting a different bad habit. I need to be mindful of my spending, so I have to be careful that my weekly and even monthly rewards aren’t too extravagant.
• Accountability: My friend and I may have been on to something with our sleep pacts, even though our lifestyles were a mess. Making someone aware–or even involved–in our efforts makes us more likely to follow through. So tell a friend or a family member what you’re trying to change, and ask them to check in with you about it every once in a while. Or you can be like me, and tell acquaintances and strangers by posting about it on the internet. Even better, if you know someone else who would also like to make or break a habit, you can work on this simultaneously so you can cheer each other one.

Resolve. Reward. Accountability.

Repeat, Repeat, Repeat

Habits are all about repetition. Eventually, things become so engrained that they aren’t hard to do. Does it bother you to have to brush your teeth in the morning? Probably not anymore. Did it bother your kids, when you first told them they had to? Maybe.

It’s fun to think that rewriting your life is all about the big choices. Embrace your catalyst and you’ll be golden. But that’s probably not true. As you create a new normal, it takes some time to figure out what behaviors will help you to be happy, healthy, and productive – and what behaviors are getting in your way.

Even heroes have to do this. Before embarking on a quest or a big battle, somewhere in the middle of the book, there’s almost always a period of training. In movies it’s usually a montage, with humorous moments of failure, an upbeat soundtrack, and eventual inspiring progress. There are skills the hero must learn to be successful in whatever he or she sets out to do. Because she masters them, she will eventually achieve her goal.

It may not seem as exciting as learning hand to hand combat, but daily habits can be the skills we need to master to rewrite our life and become who we want to be. We might fail at first. That’s okay, as long as we don’t give up. We probably can’t change too much all at once. Splitting our focus can lead to overwhelm, and wasted time wallowing in our failure.

But if you pick one habit to start with–the one that’s bothering you the most, that you know is holding you back–and make a plan to change it and motivate yourself to stick to that plan, I know you can do it. And once you’ve created or kicked that habit, you can move on to the next one.

Like a snowball rolling down a hill, you’ll gain momentum, and it’ll get easier as you go. Success is contagious. By the end of the song, you’ll be a warrior.

At least that’s how I feel today. Check in with me in a month!