The chain of habits can be changed. People are creatures of existing habits. As we wake up every morning, we go through the same routine day after day. If you think about how different today’s morning is from yesterday’s morning and the morning two months earlier, you’ll hardly find any differences. Unless we are invited to a party, going to the movies, or taking a vacation, our days are too similar to each other.
There is nothing wrong with being organized. It keeps us on track and saves lots of time. On the other hand, repetition and routine can make our life empty, insignificant, and boring. Even worse, little by little, existing habits are pulling out our creativity, curiosity, ability to be open-minded, and willingness to discover new things.
We’d rather believe in old things and repeat the same actions unsuccessfully than relearn and change our existing habits in order to succeed. Sounds odd, but it’s true.
The question is: can we CHANGE an existing habit?
The answer is: YES! It is not easy. It is not quick. It requires commitment and consistency. It may not be a lot of fun to go through.
However, change CAN happen. Thousands of people stopped drinking, quit smoking, got rid of 100 pounds, switched their job from day shifts to night shifts, moved from a tropical location to Alaska, etc.’.
Changing an existing habit is a learnable skill, similar to mastery of habit development. The trick is that the existing habit cannot be simply DELETED from the brain. Instead, it should be REPLACED.
For the sake of simplicity, I created a chart showing how a habit development process is programmed in our minds.
When we keep on doing the same things, we get the same results. To change an existing habit, we have to develop an alternative road, to perform the alternative set of actions.
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