part0030

I don’t know about you, but I have a lot of habits that I’m not even aware of that guide me through my days and weeks. Some of them are good (getting to yoga every Tuesday), and some of them are bad (checking my phone frequently), and some of them I don’t even know I’m engaging in. How much of what you do on a daily basis is a habit? Think about your morning routine—from what you have for breakfast, to how you get to work, and the way you speak to your coworkers, so much of what we do every day relies on our habits. And most of those habits are unconscious—we’re not even aware of them. Most mornings, I’m half asleep and relying on my habits to get me dressed and out the door. Other than the day of the see-through blouse, my morning habits have generally come through for me.

If we can get into the right habits to start our days, we can begin every day in a positive mindset which sets us up to have excellent days. I used to have a habit of listening to the news in the morning. Then I realized how depressing it was. Now I listen to upbeat music instead. It’s a small tweak to my morning but it’s made a huge difference in my mood and my days.

When we can improve our habits, we can drastically improve our lives. For example, I used to have a habit of sleeping until the last possible moment and racing out the door, flustered and stressed, which didn’t make for a great start to the day. Now I have children, so sleeping late is not an option. Ever. As much as I miss my sleep, I do have a way better morning habit now—meditation and stretching.

In this chapter, we’ll look at how to build a new habit, how to replace a negative habit, and some of the most effective habits that we can create for ourselves. Think about all the actions you have committed to over the course of this book. You might want to choose a few of those actions that you see as key to reducing your stress or increasing your productivity and turn them into habits.

Habits are the brain’s way of saving energy. When we’ve done something often enough, the brain simply begins to do it automatically. Our habits can be incredibly helpful. Unless they aren’t. Some of us have habits of staying up too late, watching too much TV, opening up social media sites every time we pick up our phones, or raging at our coworkers (or family members) when we’re stressed out.

The reason most of us struggle with creating good habits for ourselves is that we don’t really understand the way habits are created. In his book, The Power of Habit , Charles Duhigg makes it very clear how habits are formed:

This process within our brains is a three-step loop. First, there is a cue, a trigger that tells your brain to go into automatic mode and which habit to use. Then there is the routine, which can be physical or mental or emotional. Finally, there is a reward, which helps your brain figure out if this particular loop is worth remembering for the future.

Over time, this loop—cue, routine, reward; cue, routine, reward—becomes more and more automatic. The cue and reward become intertwined until a powerful sense of anticipation and craving emerges. Eventually . . . a habit is born. 1

Knowing how our brains create habits is really helpful. I now realize that every time I’ve tried to change a negative habit, I’ve either tried to quit cold turkey or I’ve been focused on the wrong part of the loop: the routine, or what I would consider the actual habit—like checking my e-mail as soon as I opened my computer. As Duhigg explains:

[M]ost people, when they think about habits, they focus on the behavior or the routine. But what we’ve learned is that it’s the cue and the reward that really determine why a habit unfolds. . . . [The first thing we need to do is] to diagnose the cue and the reward.” 2

Once I understood the need to focus on the cue and the reward, not just the routine, I had a better sense of how to change my habits. It became easier to recognize the cue (opening up my computer) and choosing a different routine (opening up my manuscript and writing for fifteen minutes instead of opening up my e-mail). Think about the cues that Duhigg lists. What elements cue some of your habits? Is it:

Once we understand what’s causing a cue for a habit, we can make different choices in response to the cue. Maybe the habit you want to break is picking up your phone eighty-seven times a day. Look for the cues that happen throughout your day. Times to watch for might be:

When we can identify not just the cues, but also the rewards we are seeking, we can make different choices about the routine habits we engage in. Once we understand what the craving we have is, we can find a healthier way to meet that particular need. As always, our power lies in self-awareness. It gives us the ability to understand our motivations and make different, healthier choices.

Often the reward of checking our phones is that we look busy, we don’t have to engage in awkward social situations, we get a bit of a break or distraction from what we’ve been doing, or we get the dopamine hit of having positive social interactions online.

When we can identify the reward that we are seeking, we can find a different routine to help us achieve that reward. If we’re looking for a positive social interaction through checking Facebook or Instagram to see how many likes we have, we could replace that with interacting with a coworker or friend or simply by smiling and saying hello to someone we pass in the hall or on the street. If we’re feeling stressed out and we need a break, instead of checking our phone, we could spend a few minutes box breathing. Now that you’ve thought about what reward you’re searching for when you pick up your phone, consider what different routine could get you the same reward.

I had a habit of picking up my phone every morning and checking e-mail first thing, often before I even got out of bed. I knew it was bad for me, I knew it didn’t increase my productivity or set me up well for my day, but I couldn’t seem to break the habit.

My cue was the time of day, and picking up my phone first thing in the morning quickly became a behavior that had become ritualized. I slept with the phone right next to my bed, so, when I woke up, it was an immediate reflex to check it. The reward I got from checking my e-mail was feeling like I was prepared for the day.

Logically, I knew the downsides: my brain was buzzing with work demands and already full before I’d properly woken up; I didn’t have full attention to give to my kids; and I was tiring my brain out first thing in the morning by filling it with e-mails and their associated decisions.

I couldn’t break the habit—until I dealt with the cue and the reward. The cue was relatively easy. I no longer sleep with my phone on the bedside table. It stays downstairs, so I don’t even see it until after I’ve fully woken up and engaged with my kids. I also needed to change the ritualized behavior, so instead of reaching for my phone first thing in the morning, I now reach for my water bottle.

I knew from experience that when I meditated, I started my days in a relaxed, positive state. Morning meditation never feels as easy as checking my phone, but when I meditate, I feel way more calm and prepared for my day than on the mornings when I dive right into my phone and start reading my e-mails. I’m able to be more present and connected to my kids and to my clients; my thinking is clearer, and my ideas flow more easily. That’s a really good reward, and it motivates me to build a different habit.

Duhigg’s Golden Rule of Habit Change says that the most effective way to shift a habit is to diagnose and retain the old cue and reward and try to change only the routine. 4 Too often, we naively believe that we can just stop a negative habit, forgetting the power of the cue and the reward. Think of a habit that you’d like to stop and what you might replace it with. Maybe you could replace the habit of grabbing a chocolate bar with the habit of grabbing an apple. Or you could replace the habit of thinking angry, stressful thoughts with the habit of thinking calm, peaceful ones. If you pick up your phone first thing in the morning, maybe you could replace the habit of checking e-mail with the habit of opening up a meditation app and meditating for five minutes. When we replace a habit, there’s still a familiar routine but the action is different .

In Chapter Ten we learned about how detrimental multitasking can be to our productivity. I used to multitask whenever I was on the phone with friends or family. This is embarrassing to admit because I realize how damaging it can be to a relationship to not give your full attention to it. But I’m human and flawed and super busy, so I thought multitasking would help. My habit loop started as soon as the phone rang. I would immediately put the person on speaker so I could also check my e-mail while I was having the conversation. The reward was that I felt like I was able to get more done, which is of course completely untrue. Not only was I less productive, I was far less attentive to my phone calls than I should have been.

Now when my phone rings, I still put it on speaker but any time I feel the urge to open my e-mail, I stop myself. The only multitasking I allow myself to do while I’m on the phone is walking or stretching, as they are good for my body and don’t distract my mind from the conversation. This way, I still get a reward and feel like I’ve done something good for myself, but I’m able to give my full attention to the person I’m speaking with.

When we notice what the cues are, we can consciously stop the urge to respond to them and find a different routine to replace the multitasking, one that still has a reward associated with it.

It’s only by paying careful attention and catching ourselves that we are able to change our habits. This initially takes some mental effort and focus because we are changing a behavior, which requires far more work from the brain than just following an established habit. But once we replace the bad habit (like multitasking) with a good one (like having a single focus and achieving more), we recreate that habit loop, and it becomes just as easy for our brain to follow the healthy habit loop.

When we can get our habits working for us, rather than against us, we can change our lives. The difference between whether we choose to go for a run or go for drinks when we’re stressed out often comes down to our habits. And the more often we choose one behavior over another, the more it becomes an ingrained habit that we naturally go to. Think about an unhealthy habit you may have had in the past that you replaced with a healthy one. How did changing that habit improve the quality of your life?

People who have changed their lives for the better often credit changing their habits with helping them improve their lives. We all have habits of thinking, feeling, and responding to stress that we aren’t even aware of.

One of the first steps to creating change is awareness. Remember I told you how I installed the app Moment on my phone, which showed me how many times I picked it up and how many minutes I spent on it per day? The realization that I was picking up my phone forty times a day and spending upwards of two to three hours a day on it was a serious wake-up call. Becoming aware of my behavior gave me incentive to make a change.

Often, I’d pick up the phone for only a minute or two, seeking the reward of some mental stimulation and distraction. I was working, so some of that time was justified, but I was well aware that at least half of my screen time was a total waste. I was losing approximately an hour a day of productivity because of a bad habit.

I maintained this habit even when I knew it was interfering with my productivity. I had to identify the cue and the reward, so I could make different choices. The cue was usually that I was tired of working or parenting, and the reward I wanted was a break. Once I identified those elements, it was easier to make different choices.

When I felt like I needed a break (the cue), instead of picking up my phone (the routine), I’d walk around the house, get a glass of water, or do some stretches. It helped me feel more relaxed (the reward), but stretching or drinking a glass of water offered a much healthier break than mindlessly checking my e-mails or scrolling through Facebook. The reward was the same; I wasn’t wrestling with PowerPoint for at least five minutes.

When we become more self-aware, it’s a lot easier to change our habits. Our power lies in identifying our cues and rewards and doing the hard work of changing our routines. If you know you have a habit that isn’t serving you, you have the power to change it.

Yes, it will be hard work, but it will be worth it. Once you’ve accomplished the difficult task of replacing a negative habit with a healthy one, your brain will naturally take the healthy route because it’s become a habit. Changing your habits can literally change your life.

Think about one habit you could experiment with changing and give it a try. See what the positive impacts are. Usually, when we’re getting good results, we’re motivated to keep forming the new habit.

We’ve talked in previous chapters about noticing our beliefs and paying attention to our inner voice, the language we use, and the thoughts we have. Often our habits of thinking can become habits we aren’t even aware of: “According to the research of Dr. Fred Luskin of Stanford University, a human being has approximately 60,000 thoughts per day —and 90 percent of these are repetitive!” 5

That’s a lot of thoughts we have—and a whole lot of echo. We want our habits of thought to be ones that help, not hinder us. Our brains are lazy; they go down our most well-developed pathways of thinking. If your well-developed pathways of thinking are focused on stress, negativity, and drama, your habits of thinking aren’t serving you. We’ve already discussed the value of paying attention to your thoughts—this can be particularly helpful in noticing negative habits of thinking and replacing them with more positive habits of thinking.

I remember discussing with a client once how hard he was on himself. He gave me some examples of the things his harsh inner voice would say to him. His mind was filled with thoughts like: You suck, You totally blew that, You’ll never get this right, You’ll never be smart enough, I can’t believe how badly you messed up, That guy doesn’t really like you, he’s just being nice, and You’ll never be good enough . He asked me, “Doesn’t everyone have this harsh inner voice? ”

It was a moment of great insight for him and a burst of happiness for me as I explained, “I used to have that voice. It was cruel and judgmental and put a lot of pressure on me. Then I started paying attention to the thoughts that weren’t serving me and replaced them. Now my inner voice is loving and kind and encouraging. Occasionally I’ll slip, and my dragon voice will return, but it’s rare.”

I’ve created a different habit of thinking and now my brain naturally goes down more compassionate and positive pathways of thinking. My client spent the next few weeks paying attention to his thoughts. He was astounded to find how many of the same themes emerged—all of them negative, none of them serving him. He was even more amazed to realize that he didn’t have to listen to them.

When we fall into mean, judgmental thinking, we are doing ourselves and everyone we engage with an incredible disservice. Instead of taking that path, let’s bring the best of who we are to our work, to our relationships, to our lives.

Whatever thoughts we think and behaviors we engage in most regularly build up neuropathways in our brains and make it easier for our brains to follow that route. The more often we do something, the more likely we are to create a smooth, fast highway for our thoughts and behaviors to travel down. That’s why some thoughts and behaviors feel “natural.”

It’s up to us to create new pathways for our brains and to create new habits of thinking, ensuring that we are operating at our best. If we can create the habit of positive and optimistic thinking, our lives will dramatically improve.

This new pathway will initially feel like driving down a pitted, bumpy country road. But the more you practice thinking positively, the stronger that pathway becomes, until that highway of negative thinking has crumbled into a dirt road and the bumpy country road of positive thinking has become the highway. With practice, your thoughts will automatically go down the positive and optimistic route.

So, how do we change our habits of thinking from negative to positive? We start with self-awareness and begin paying attention to our thoughts. This is where mindfulness and slowing down enough to notice our thoughts can be really helpful. Once we notice our negative thoughts, then we interrupt the unhealthy thought patterns. Every time you notice a negative, mean, or judgmental thought about yourself or another person, interrupt it—I sing a little skipping song from childhood that goes “fudge, fudge, call the judge.” This helps me interrupt the negative thought and allows me to change it. After I’ve sung the song and interrupted my pattern of negative thinking, I replace it with something more positive and compassionate.

Positive habits of thinking and responding to stress are going to lead to good results in our lives just as negative habits in how we think and respond to stress are going to lead to more stress.

Many of us have an all-or-nothing way of thinking, and that includes how we see the process of building habits. We start off with great intentions and momentum. Then, we falter. We miss a day or two, and instead of being compassionate with ourselves and recognizing that it’s hard to make a change, we completely give up on whatever habit we were trying to build. As far as I can tell, no good habits are ever built easily. Negative habits seem to form very easily; they have a quick reward response (like a sugar hit after a bite of chocolate), but good habits don’t often give us that quick hit. Instead, they give us a more lasting and satisfying reward.

I’ve got a habit of reaching for chocolate every time I feel stressed or hungry or tired. That was one easy habit to create. The habit of meditating in the morning is still a work in progress after fifteen years.

Few habits are built one day at a time in perfect succession. You will mess up and fall back into old patterns. That’s normal and natural, so please, don’t give up. To make it easier to build new habits, rely on what the research tells us:

If you believe you can change, surround yourself with supportive people, and reinforce a positive vision of where you want your life to go, you’re going to build some really positive habits.

Let’s say you didn’t get a job you applied for. Does the story that you tell yourself become, I’m useless, and I’m not good enough , or, I guess that job wasn’t meant for me , or, It seems I have a few more things I need to learn before I’m ready. What can I do to gain the skills?

Our habits of thinking influence absolutely everything in our lives. Our beliefs drive our behavior; our behavior produces results that reflect our beliefs. Remember the research that found that confidence in our abilities was a greater predictor of success than our actual abilities?

When we believe that we are capable—of doing a great job, of making change, of being highly productive—we can create habits of thinking and behaving to ensure that we become capable and highly productive.

If we believe that we are stuck, that we can’t change, that our habits drive us and we have no power over them, our habits of thinking will reinforce those beliefs.

Keystone habits are habits that have a far-reaching impact on your life. As Charles Duhigg explains, keystone habits are central, core habits that have a domino effect and create more healthy habits. Exercise has been identified as a keystone habit, one that positively impacts many other aspects of your life. Remember the research that found that people who exercise eat better, are more productive at work, are more patient and less stressed? That’s because research has identified that “exercise is a keystone habit that triggers widespread change.” 6

It was when I read this research that I committed to exercising more regularly. Doesn’t it just make you want to go for a run because that’s going to make everything in your life better? They even found that people who exercise more have less credit card debt! I mean, come on, that makes it worth getting up off the couch, right?

Keystone habits work because when we do something that makes us feel good (like exercise), that makes us want to keep doing things that make us feel good (like drinking water instead of wine).

We have all experienced this. You replace an old habit with a more productive one, or you start a new habit altogether. You have a small win that generates momentum, so you not only keep doing what you’ve been doing, you add in other positive behaviors. For example, a friend and I went to yoga the other night, then we went for dinner. Although we usually have a glass of wine or two with dinner, we both felt far too healthy after yoga to indulge in the wine.

Academics studying the effectiveness of Alcoholics Anonymous found that there were two crucial elements that enabled people to make successful and long-lasting change in their lives after addiction: belief and a supportive community. 7 Duhigg tells us that “belief was the ingredient that made a reworked habit loop into a permanent behavior. For habits to permanently change, people must believe that change is feasible.” 8

When we believe we can change, we begin to find evidence of our ability to change. We think of ways we have changed in the past or find examples of little changes we are making in order to grow right now.

The other element that the researchers identified as a crucial part of our ability to create long-lasting habit change was community. 9 Sometimes belief is hard to hold onto all on our own. It’s why I work with a business coach and have been involved in mastermind groups in the past. In a mastermind group, people come together with the aim of growing, learning, and supporting one another. The people I met while participating in mastermind groups were highly motivated, and they not only believed they would succeed, they believed their fellow group members would as well. Their support, belief, and similar experiences were very valuable to me when I was starting up my business .

Duhigg shares that researchers have found that “belief is easier when it occurs within a community. For most people who overhaul their lives, there are no seminal moments or life-altering disasters. There are simply communities—sometimes of just one other person—who make change believable.” 10

Thinking back to the research on how our friends and their social circles influence us, it’s even more important that we surround ourselves with people who believe in us and in our capacity to change and grow. Take a minute now to think about who those people are in your life; commit to building stronger relationships and spending more time with them, and to support them with their goals and beliefs as they support you with yours.

If we can create some good habits, we’ll be more relaxed, more productive, and our lives will be way better. And once we’ve done the hard work of creating a good habit, it becomes easy to do because we don’t have to think. The highway in our brain has been built, and we naturally travel down it. Our good habits become automatic (kind of like reaching for that chocolate when we’re stressed, only better!).

If you haven’t already done so, I’d suggest you look back through the questions at the end of each chapter and choose at least one action you can turn into a habit. If you choose only two habits, why not choose exercise and creating a positive state of mind? If we can master those, we’ll end up with a whole lot of additional benefits as well.

After you’ve determined what you’re going to make a habit of, I strongly encourage you to find someone who can support you and hold you accountable. Maybe you can pair up with a coworker or friend, start working with a coach, or join a group. An easy option is to ask someone else to read this book and join you by becoming your accountability partner in creating new positive habits.

Whatever you want to become stronger at, start making a habit of it and watch your life transform. Build on the momentum you have now and take the actions to build the habits that will help you create the life you want and deserve .

If we can create positive, healthy habits, we’ll be Working Well without even trying. If you make a habit of taking actions that put you in a positive state, reduce your stress, and enable you to be highly productive, your life will be so much better than if you have habits that put you in a negative, stressed-out state.

With healthy, high-performing habits, you’ll be learning, growing, and giving the best of yourself to your work, your family, your friends, and yourself every day. Yes, it’s going to be hard work and uncomfortable to replace negative habits with positive ones. I mean, who doesn’t want to reach for chocolate instead of an apple? But, as someone who has switched that habit, I have more energy after the apple and a happier relationship with my pants, so the reward has come through and reinforced the new habit.

I encourage you to find one action that you know will help you reduce your stress or increase your productivity, and make a habit of it. It might be something as simple as leaving work on time every day, getting to sleep earlier every night, or closing your door for an hour a day to work on your most important priorities. I realize how hard it can be to change our habits, but it’s worth the investment—so go for it!

If you want to make Working Well a habit and join a supportive community that will enable you to make lasting change, please check out my online Working Well course packages at https://www.managetoengage.com/working-well/ . I’d love to help you create habits that will lead you to a life of feeling positive, healthy, relaxed, and productive, no matter what challenges you may be experiencing.