Habits are a funny thing because they seem so obvious to everyone. When a behavior is repeated with a high degree of frequency over time it becomes a habit. If the behavior is easy to do and requires little effort or thought the more likely it is to become a long-lasting habit. It is all pretty basic. Some people rail against the idea of forming habits to lose weight because it all seems too Pavolov’s dogs, or rats chasing after cheese in a maze for them. I get that but here’s the truth. The truth is everyone already has habits even if they are not conscious of them.
A Day in a Life of a Weight Watcher
Here is a story I’ve heard before. A woman closes up her kitchen for the night and then sits in a favorite chair. She enjoys winding down her day by reading a book. After a while, a snack craving happens. She tries to ignore it but eventually succumbs getting up and going back into her kitchen, thinking to herself, “I closed the kitchen.” to make herself a snack. As she is doing it she may even be thinking, “I should not be having a snack. I’m not even that hungry.” Then she eats the snack (or snacks) as she reads her book. She has mixed feelings of reward and disappointment, chalking it all up to a lack of willpower. This happens night after night and is sabotaging her weight loss. The root cause is not a lack of willpower, this is an example of an unhelpful, unconscious, habit.
Strategy #4: Habits are Helpers
It’s easy to read along with this and say, well ok Captain Obvious. It’s obvious to us right now because we are not the ones experiencing the cravings, or anticipating the rewards that habits bring with them. I’ve been that woman, and I can tell you for sure, it wasn’t obvious to me. I know at least some of you reading right now are doing this same behavior too. So how do we get rid of unhelpful habits? We wake up to them and then we redesign our lives.
I was able to redesign my habits to get rid of snacking at night but I noticed I had not been reading. I love to read fiction, and I need to read nonfiction for work if I am going to stay abreast of the latest educational trends. So I redesigned my life with a helpful habit.
- I included reading for 20 minutes a night on my habit tracker.
- Each day I think about a convenient time to read for 20 minutes. Sometimes it’s during lunch, or in the evening, I like having flexibility.
- The reward comes from two things: checking off the habit on my tracker (because it’s a habit I want to create) and the act of reading itself.
Habits happen either way. Will you make them your friend or foe? I am telling you it’s not fate, you get to make that decision. If you master your habits you can get anything you really want. This is true for weight loss, and anything else. Think about this because I am telling you are your greatest resource if you know how to tap into your power.
If you’d like to purchase this habit tracker go to my Amazon List
Getting to Goal 