Hi Friends,
As we make our way through January, are you still holding true to that diet? Or the habit change you told yourself? Do you have any bad habits that you want to break? Do you have any habits you would like to create? Ahem, those new year’s resolutions you made for yourself.
Making new year’s resolutions can be great to jumpstart a new habit; however, is it hard to keep up with it?
Let’s scratch the surface of habit change. Charles Duhigg writes about the habit loop in The Power of Habit. The habit loop is: cue, routine, reward. James Clear writes about a habit loop in his book, Atomic Habits, that cues, craving, response, and reward is the backbone of every habit.
The Cue: a signal to the brain to initiate a routine or craving. Your brain wants to be rewarded so it looks for cues to seek reward.
Let me set the scene: Your new year’s resolution is to eat out less and meal plan. You’re leaving work and your stomach tells your brain you are hungry and you need a nice meal to eat. This is a cue.
Cravings: a powerful desire for something. Cues are nothing until your brain transforms them into cravings. These transformations can be sparked by thoughts, feelings, emotions, and/or environments.
Scene: After that long day of work, you’re driving home and you see a variety of fast food restaurants. You can smell the fried food. You’re cravings for food are heightened.
Response/Routine: the act. This is the actual habit you perform or your routine. The response will deliver the reward. How much energy are you willing to expend? Are you going to choose the path of least resistance? Then you’ll fall back into the same routine your brain knows.
Scene: Although, your cravings are high, you keep driving home. You told yourself you spent good money on groceries and you plan to cook. This is the hard part, if you’re tired, stressed, etc the path of least resistance looks really good. Plus scientifically, your brain defaults to what you know so if your old habit was the drive through, your brain defaults to this routine.
Reward: Achievement. YOU DID IT. In habits, this is actually satisfying that craving and your brain saying “HEY, remember this habit loop!” The reward closes the habit loop. If you aren’t satisfied then your brain doesn’t associate reward with the loop.
Scene: Cooked dinner, enjoyed the meal, satisfied. New habit is forming.
You might be thinking, “yeah yeah, I do this but cannot stick with it.” Review the response/routine section. Are you setting yourself up for the path of least resistance? In this example, driving home could have included a route that did not pass fast food restaurants even if it was the long way home. You have to give your brain repeatable closed loops to crave itself a new pathway. Not to mention, you have to believe in yourself. If you’re creating a new routine but continue to tell yourself it’s not working, then it’s not working.
Again, this is scratching the surface of forming new habits or changing old ones. I wanted to share this with you to give you some foundation to build from. Making a new year’s resolution is great but you need to have a plan to create a new habit loop. Best part is: you have ALL year to create new habit loops. No one said they have to be completed by the end of January.
What to continue to learn, check out this article.
ROAM to conquering habits.