Not Resolutions, But Habits
January 5, 2017

The new year brings many resolutions--I'm going to lose weight/save
money/exercise more/write every day. And many of those resolutions go by the
wayside in just a couple of weeks, if they last that long. The reason is that
many people make resolutions, not realizing that what they are actually mean to
say is, "I'll develop the habit of..." For example, "exercising more" really
means "exercise every day." This is a habit, rather than a resolution.

So how does one build a habit? There are countless guides on the Internet, and a
quick search is bound to find a dozen good articles on the topic. But I'd like
to also offer my personal method of building habits. I start by deciding exactly
what habit I want to cultivate. Otherwise, there's no way I can set a goal. Once
I have a final goal, I pick a daily goal that moves me towards building the
habit I want to cultivate.  The daily goal I pick is impossibly easy--reading a
single page of a book, or ten push ups or writing just one paragraph.

It seems silly to set such easy goals, but I've found that a number of small
successes builds a habit quicker than hit-or-miss attempts to reach more
ambitious goals. Repeated small successes build momentum. And remember, these
goals are minimums. I'll gladly do more if I can. The idea is to build the habit
by doing the action every day. And if you want to do something every day,
smaller goals make that more likely.

 Once I have my daily goals set, I make sure I do them every day--even if I have
to stay up an extra few minutes to accomplish them. (This is another reason for
keeping my daily goals short.) I don't allow myself to go to bed until I've
taken care of my daily goals. It's important not to miss a single day--it takes
several weeks of doing something daily to make it a habit.

Here's a real-world example: When I set my daily goal for practicing
tachygraphy, I decided it would be a single sentence. So writing "I'm too tired
to practice tonight," was all I needed to accomplish my goal. Some days that was
all I wrote. Other days, I wrote more. But I wrote something every day. I've
been practicing tachygraphy now for almost eighteen months, and the habit is
firmly established. All by setting an easy daily goal, and sticking to it.

Whatever method you use, good luck in building new habits in 2017.

(c) 2017 by Andrew Gudgel 
email: contact [at] andrewgudgel.com