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How you can actually stick to new habits (for more than just a few days) - Tóm tắt là thực hiện Atomic Habit.

It’s very weird when you feel really motivated and decided to make a change in your life and start positive habits (or stop negative ones) but all of a sudden, after a couple of days, that motivation fades out. For most people, this is a never-ending, lifelong struggle, and it sucks. They tell themselves stuff like: “Someday I will discipline myself and achieve my goals” or “Someday I’ll commit to my passions and work on them non-stop”, except that they never do and they cling to the hope that “someday everything will change”. Well, I was exactly like that until I got tired of waiting and decided to take action for myself. A couple of years (and failures) later and I can practically say I’m a new person. Today, I want to share with you 4 keys that helped me stick to new habits. For good.

  1. Bring clarity to your mind. Sometimes, our “goals” are actually very confusing and ambiguous by default. There’s a HUGE difference between “I want to lose weight” and “ I want to lose 10 kilos by June 17th 2021. I will achieve this by going to the gym 4 times a week, counting my calories and keeping a workout journal so that I’m able to track my progress and see my sticking points to correct them, week by week”. Now, I’m not a fitness expert but you get the point. Like Brian Tracy said, “a goal without a plan is only a dream”.
  2. Identify how you’re most likely to fail. This key is very simple, hope for the best but plan for the worst. What has made you quit before? How can you avoid making that mistake again?
  3. Make it easy for you. Both to start and maintain the habit. Hard stuff creates resistance, resistance makes you quit. People get really excited when they are motivated, they want to start waking up at 5 a.m. and go for a 40 minute monday run followed by a cold shower and a 30 minute meditation session. Yeah that’s not gonna happen overnight. Start with just one habit and start it simple. 30 minute meditation? Try just a 3 minute one every single day. You’ll feel way less resistance and you’ll be more likely to stick to it for more days, enough to integrate that habit into your “Normality Line”. You can worry about increasing the time after that.
  4. Go easy on yourself. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself. Listen, you will fail, a lot. It is to be expected, and it’s only natural when you start doing something you are not used to do. Failing isn’t the problem, the problem is that many people completely give up once they slightly digress from the habit. They feel like they already failed and they go back to their old ways. Of course, this makes them feel very bad for months until one day, they suddenly get a burst of inspiration and decide that they are ready to make a change for real this time… Except they don’t actually change their behaviors and the cycle repeats itself. Realize that you are in this for the long run and that patience pays. Please don’t completely drop your progress when you fail, just learn from your mistakes and get ready to dominate the next day.