dear friends,
As someone with five decades of habits, I’m familiar with the good, the bad and the ugly. I know them all. Good ones, like making the bed and exercising regularly. Unskillful ones, like binge eating and over-imbibing. And down-right ugly ones, like letting my cruel inner critic run the show. I can joke now about how Dulce de Leche ice cream and popcorn got me through law school, but I’ll tell you it didn’t feel so hot at the time. The truth is our habits impact how we feel every single day. They matter (yes, even the silly ones). When we have skillful ones, we move through our lives with more ease. And when we have unskillful ones? Well, we all know how that feels (and if you don’t, please don’t tell the rest of us).
Why am I talking about all this? Because I’m currently changing an entrenched habit. I’d like to make the shift quickly and then move into maintenance mode. But, as we all know, that’s the real trick: how to not only make a change, but to make that change so thoroughly that the new, more skillful behavior becomes routine.
Once upon a time, science told us willpower was the answer. Then, in the 1990s, Roy Baumeister did his famous cookie/radish experiment that left us with the ego depletion theory (study participants were given the option of eating either cookies or radishes and then asked to solve and unsolvable puzzle. The people who gave up early ate radishes instead of cookies. The theory was it took willpower to choose radishes over cookies, so the radish eaters had less willpower to keep trying to solve the puzzle). More recently, Michael Inzlicht has offered a view of willpower not as a resource to run out of but as an emotion that can be nurtured. Neuroscience is making a lot of progress, but we’re still at the beginning stages of understanding what it takes to make lasting change.
And while I’m as interested as the next person to see what the people who study brains discover, I’ve got a life to live in the meantime…and some habits to change.
So, here’s my gentle habit practice:
(1) Create a habit profile. When I first tried to change a habit during the early stages of the pandemic, I started with the precept of clear seeing. I mean, how could I go in trying to change something without knowing the basics? I started with an overview of my habits, at least all of them I could think of, and I asked myself three questions: Is it helpful? Flossing: yes; late-night snacking: no. Is it intentional? Going to the library on weekday mornings to write: yes; not paying attention to the details of things I’m not good at: no. Is it a commission or omission habit? Meditating in the morning is a habit of commission; not swearing is a habit of omission. In other words, is the habit something you do or something you don’t do. These questions are just a starting point. The important thing is to get curious. Don’t judge yourself. There isn’t a right or a wrong way to habit. This is the time to figure out your habit profile so that you can work more skillfully with your habits.
(2) Brainstorm fun things that will add to OR be incongruent with your habit. Fun works both for habits you want to start and habits you’d like to let go. The only thing that really matters is that the thing you’re linking really is wonderfully fun for you. Like, you relax or smile just thinking about it. In the first stages of habit formation, you’re already doing a lot of heavy lifting by not doing what you usually do or doing what you usually don’t. Give yourself credit for that, and know that it’s not enough to get you to maintenance mode. What you need now is fun. When I was letting go of my late-night snacking habit, I cultivated a somewhat elaborate night-time ritual which included jazz, some body brushing, and lengthy stretches. I love all of these inconsistent-with-snacking activities, and that fun helped me stick with the letting go long enough for habit energy to dissipate. Adding fun helps in exactly the same way when you’re cultivating a habit. The only thing that matters, as far as I can tell, is that the fun is something you feel immediately in your own body. The fun sends a message to all of you that this change doesn’t come from forcing, but from kindness.
(3) Prepare to do heavy lifting until the habit takes hold. This is the slog bit. It will last as long as it takes, but if you have found the right fun thing, you’ll be able to rely on your own discipline when it’s there and when discipline isn’t showing up, you can rely on the fun. And, if after some time, you find the fun thing isn’t working, try something new. Experiment as often as it takes to find the right fun thing.
(4) Expect to have stretches of relapse (and forgive yourself!) You will relapse. It’s okay. And it’s okay if it happens again, and again. But, then, at some point, you’ll have shifted into a new way of being. You’ll know you’re there because that’s when you’ll find yourself just doing (or not doing) the thing without thinking about it. I realized my yoga practice was really and truly my yoga practice when I stopped listing it on my to-do list because it had become as much a part of my daily habits as brushing my teeth. If I miss some time on the mat now, I don’t get upset about it because I know that I will get on the mat again because it’s my habit.
That’s it for this week. I’m wishing for all of us trying to let go or establish a habit: a little bit of discipline and a lot of fun!
warmly,
alison
