How to Make Your Future Habits Easy

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While researching Atomic Habits, I found a story that forthwith affected Pine Tree State with its simplicity and power.

It was the story of assassinator Nuckols, associate IT developer from town, Mississippi, and his straightforward strategy for creating future habits straightforward.

 

Nuckols refers to the approach as “resetting the room.”

For instance, when he finishes watching television, he places the remote back on the TV stand, arranges the pillows on the couch, and folds the blanket.

When he leaves his automobile, he throws any trash away.

Whenever he takes a shower, he wipes down the toilet while the shower is warming up.

(As he notes, the “perfect time to clean the toilet is right before you wash yourself in the shower anyway.”)

This might sound like he's just “cleaning up” but there is a key insight that makes his approach different. The purpose of resetting each room is not simply to clean up after the last action, but to prepare for the next action.

“When I walk into an area everything is in its right place,” Nuckols wrote.

“Because I do this every day in every room, stuff always stays in good shape . . .

People assume I work effortlessly however I’m really very lazy.

I’m just proactively lazy. It gives you so much time back.”

I have written antecedently concerning the facility of the setting to form your behavior.

Resetting the room is one way to put the power back in your own hands. Let's talk about how you can use it.

The Power of Priming the Environment

Whenever you organize a space for its intended purpose, you are priming it to make the next action easy. This is one of the most practical and simple ways to improve your habits.

For instance, my wife keeps a box of greeting cards that are presorted by occasion—birthday, sympathy, wedding, graduation, and more.

Whenever necessary, she grabs an appropriate card and sends it off.

She is implausibly smart at basic cognitive process to send cards as a result of she has reduced the friction of doing therefore.

 

For years, I was the opposite. Someone would have a baby and I would think, “I should send a card.” But then weeks would pass and by the time I remembered to pick one up at the store, it was too late. The habit wasn’t easy.

There are many ways to prime your environment so it’s ready for immediate use. If you want to cook a healthy breakfast, place the skillet on the stove, set the cooking spray on the counter, and lay out any plates and utensils you’ll need the night before.

When you awaken, making breakfast will be easy.

 

Here are some more:

Want to draw more? Put your pencils, pens, notebooks, and drawing tools on top of your desk, within easy reach.

Want to exercise? Set out your workout clothes, shoes, gym bag, and water bottle ahead of time.

Want to improve your diet?

Chop up a large amount of fruits and vegetables on weekends and pack them in containers, so you have easy access to healthy, ready-to-eat options during the week.

 

These square measure straightforward ways in which to create the great habit the trail of travail.

 

The Path of Most Resistance

You can conjointly invert this principle and prime the setting to create unhealthy behaviors tough.

 

If you discover yourself looking at an excessive amount of tv, for example, then unplug it after each use.

Only plug it back in if you can say out loud the name of the show you want to watch. (Which prevents you from turning on Netflix and “just finding something” to watch.) This setup creates just enough friction to prevent mindless viewing.

If that doesn’t do it, you can take it a step further. Unplug the television and take the batteries out of the remote after each use, so it takes an extra ten seconds to turn it back on. And if you’re really hard-core, move the television out of the living room and into a closet after each use. You can be sure you’ll only take it out when you really want to watch something.

The bigger the friction, the less likely the habit.

 

Whenever doable, I leave my phone in a different room until lunch.

When it’s right next to me, I’ll check it all morning for no reason at all. But when it is in another room, I rarely think about it. And the friction is high enough that I won’t go get it without a reason.

As a result, I get three to four hours each morning when I can work without interruption.

 

If sticking your phone in another room doesn’t seem like enough, tell a friend or family member to hide it from you for a few hours. Ask a coworker to keep it at their desk in the morning and give it back to you at lunch.

It is outstanding however very little friction is needed to stop unhealthy behavior.

When I hide brew within the back of the refrigerator wherever I can’t see it, I drink less.

When I delete social media apps from my phone, it can be weeks before I download them again and log in.

 

These tricks are unlikely to curb a true addiction, but for many of us, a little bit of friction can be the difference between sticking with a good habit or sliding into a bad one.

Imagine the accumulative impact of constructing dozens of those changes associated living in an setting designed to create the great behaviors easier and therefore the unhealthy behaviors more durable.

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