January 1st: you’re pumped and fired up and ready to crush your fitness goals.
but then…
January 2nd: 5am. your alarm goes off and all you want to do is go back to sleep.
3 weeks later: January 31st. your gym gear starts collecting dust.
forgotten.
What if there was a way to avoid falling off your new habits?
according to psychologist Daniel Kahneman, successful behavior change boils down to 2 things:
- remove the block of resistance
- accelerate the growth by increasing the reward.
Here are 3 ways to remove the block
- embrace the suck!
your first draft will be messy. your first video will be awkward. that first run is going to be exhausting.
accept it, embrace it, and just begin.
procrastinating isn’t going to make your progress faster.
quitting won’t accelerate growth.
- prep the night before
make it easy by creating your habit as the path of least resistance.
queue up your music playlist, sleep in your gym clothes (or put them right next to your bed), and fill your water bottle & put your keys and shoes together.
- remove distractions
Increase the resistance for your distractions.
- if you’re trying to eat healthier, don’t buy junk food.
- if you’re trying to write more and scroll less, install app blockers on your phone & computer.
- if you’re trying to go outside more often, unplug your gaming console or at least log out after each use.
However, there are limitations to these:
they are all focused on removing the inertia of starting, but:
- you won’t become jr tolken by staying in your suck essays. You still need to edit them.
- you won’t get jacked by going to the gym and doing 1 pushup. You’ll eventually need to crank out that brutal rep.
- you’re not going to achieve mental clarity just by not eating doritos. you’ll eventually need to meditate, wrestle with your emotions, and even attempt to make those god-awful smoothies that keep showing up on your instagram explore page.
Removing the block isn’t enough.
To grow, we must leave our comfort zones.
When this happens, you can compensate by using this mental exercise to make your reward greater than the resistance.
Here’s an example, follow this framework:
- yes, [insert your concern/ challenge here] might happen.
- but being [identity based adjective]
- will (benefits)
*when brainstorming your benefits, try to think of the immediate and long-term benefits.
how will my life be different in 10 years if I started this habit today?
Visualize the benefits (sell it to yourself!) so the anticipation of the reward outweighs the resistance.
Example:
- Yes my quads are sore or it’s cold I don’t want to run at 5am.
- But being healthy and fit
- Will boost my focus, make me happier, and help me live longer so I can spend more time with my family and grow old with my best friends while backpacking around the world & eating whatever I want.
Now, that 5am run doesn’t seem so bad right?
Short term discomfort, long term gain.
Short term comfort, long term loss.
What will you choose?
For those of you who think this is just some woo-woo, it works!
Research has found that athletes who visualize their goals are are more successful.
Action Reflection (let’s bridge the gap between vision and action)
how will you show up for yourself today?
how can you start with 5 minutes?
