This is optimal living daily. What is habit stacking and how to create habits that stick by surely of daring living.com and I'm just a molic This is where I read to you with permission from the authors to give us both a little push in the right direction every day And fairly quickly it may be around ten minutes a day So without let's get right to our next one as we optimize your life What is habit stacking and how to create habits that stick by surely of daring living.com? Alright, let's face it by this point We pretty much all know what are considered good habits and all the advantages that will benefit us if we develop them actions Like exercise more, eat less chunk food, read more books, wake up earlier, etc So why aren't we doing them? Because the challenging part is not starting these actions But it's sticking to these routines long enough for them to turn into habits.
When you first start something It can take up a lot of mental energy and requires lots of self-discipline That's why it's so difficult, my filia. What if I tell you right now that there's a way to trick your brain into believing You've been doing a routine long enough, so it's more likely for you to stick with it long-term This is called habit stacking, which is the method of stacking a new routine on top of an already established habit. The habit loop. Before we dive deeper into how it works, however, it's important to first understand how habits are formed.
Our brain is always looking for ways to save effort. It has a tendency to chunk our actions into sets of automatic routines. Charles Duhigg and the power of habits described each set to consist of three steps. The Q, routine, and reward.
Q, a sign that triggers the brain to go on autopilot mode. Routine, physical or mental behavior that follows after the Q. And reward, the positive stimulus that reinforces the routine. The next time the same Q was present, the brain would crave for the reward and perform the routine on autopilot.
For example, I used to place my workout clothes on my bed before work. Every day after work, I would come home and see the workout clothes, my Q. I'd get changed and hit the gym, routine, and afterward, I would congratulate myself by making a delicious smoothie reward. Over time, when I see the workout clothes, I immediately think about the smoothie afterward, and I'll be able to perform the routine easily.
And there you go, my habit is formed. By understanding the habit loop and how habits are formed, you can already make conscious decisions to change an existing habit or create a new one. What is habit stacking? On a daily basis, we perform many habits already.
Actions like getting out of bed, turning on the coffee maker, taking a shower, driving to work, eating lunch, heading home from work, eating dinner, turning off the lights, going to sleep, etc. Have you ever had a time or many times where you came out of the shower and immediately began brushing your teeth without realizing it? These habits are already rooted in our brain that they barely require any mental energy at all to perform. The trick to developing new habits faster is to use these established habits as the Q to trigger the new routine that you want to create.
Some examples, after I take a shower, I will stretch for 20 minutes. After I come home from work, I will go out for a jog. Right after I wake up, I'll say a prayer. After I eat dinner, I'll read 10 pages of a book.
Basically, you are stacking your new habits on top of an existing one, and your brain will learn to chunk these two routines together. With this method, it will be much more likely for you to actually form a habit and stick with it. However, make sure that these established habits are actions you already do regularly in order for it to work. I also use this habit stacking technique to create my morning rituals.
So try thinking about which habits you want to create and see how you can schedule those routines so they can be immediately before or after an already established habit. More tips on creating habits. Try not to be too ambitious and create many new habits at once. Each new habit requires mental effort to form in the beginning, and you don't want to diversify that energy because that was me.
Instead, try focusing first on the keystone habits that will impact you the most. Last but not least, if you aren't able to build a habit that you want right away, it's okay. On average, the length of time it takes to form a habit can range anywhere from 21 to 254 days. Remember, slow progress is better than no progress, so be patient with it.
As I love to say, but very true, it really is a journey. So just keep trying, and if things don't work out, change things up and try again. For example, you can try altering the queue. Maybe you cannot work out in the morning because you are a night person.
Anyways, help this article give you some tips on creating habits faster. I really hope that this has helped you work real journey in some way, wishing you best of luck, and as always, you know I'm rooting for you. You just listened to the post titled, What Is Habit Sacking and How To Create Habits That Stick by Shirley of DaringLiving.com, and I'll be right back with my commentary. I'm constantly thinking about how to optimize my health, what supplements to take, hours of sleep, what my diet should focus on.
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And head to superpower.com and use code old at checkout for an additional $20 off your membership. They get Shirley, some good tips here. I personally do find that I'm much more likely to keep up certain habits and routines if they're stacked together. So for example, I like to get some sun in the morning, and then we'll follow that with meditation.
Lately, I've also gone straight from getting ready for bed to reading a bit instead of looking at my phone. And another which I think I brought up recently is that I'll do a very quick gratitude practice before going to bed. So basically between reading and falling asleep, and I'll just do it in my head thinking about three things I'm grateful for. For me, it's much easier to remember and do when they're stacked together like that.
One thing I will say is that feeling some kind of benefit from it, and I guess that could be the reward that Shirley talked about, but personally I like some deeper benefit, not like a consumable, more like a sense of why. I feel like that helps keep it up longer term, like months and years, instead of maybe days and weeks. But in either case, I think habit stacking is worth a try if you're not doing that already. But with that, have a great rest of your day, build those habits and routines, and I'll catch you tomorrow, where you're optimal life.
I'll wait.