Admit it. We are stubborn. We make New Year’s resolutions and fail year after year. We want to change for better but most of the time we stay within our comfort zone. Taking a step different from what we are used to just seems like so much effort. It kills my dad to ask him to try a new food. We are a creature of habits. Our brain clings to habits at the exclusion of all else. Habits power our everyday life. We don’t particular enjoy brushing teeth but we do it every day without having to think about it. How can we make that important behavior change by manipulating our habits? First we need to examine the anatomy of habits.

The Habit Loop

Think about this. You buy a popcorn when you watch movie. The movie-watching almost always makes you feel good at the end. After some time, you develop the habit of eating popcorns whenever you watch a movie. Movie is the cue for your popcorn-eating routine, which gives you a reward of feeling good at the end of the movie. This is the habit loop. It is composed of “Cue-Routine-Reward”.

Habits are difficult to eradicate. But we can take a stab at the habit loop by changing the cue, swapping the routine, or creating a different reward.

To learn in more detail how to do this, check out this interesting article by Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit. This skill, once you have committed to applying it, is extremely powerful and can change your life. Are you always frustrated about eating too much and unable to lose weight? Are you always distracted and find excuses not to exercise? Are you trying to quit smoking but couldn’t? This might help you.