The Habit Loop
All habit loop phases work together to help create new habits. Today, I'd like to discuss the first factor: habit cues (or triggers).
There are five fundamental ways that a new habit can be triggered. You can select the right type for the particular habit you want to develop if you know each one. Here's what you need to know about each cue:
1. First Cue: Time
Time is often the most common way to trigger a new habit. For example, consider common morning habits. Waking up in the morning typically triggers a series of habits like going to the bathroom, washing up, brushing teeth, getting dressed, and preparing a cup of coffee.
Also, there are fewer common ways in which time triggers our behavior. For example, if you pay attention, you'll notice that you repeat certain tasks at particular times of the day. You could take a smoking break at the same time every morning, have a snack at the same time every afternoon, and so on.
If these habits are negative, consider reflecting on how you feel during those times. Your habits can often be an indicator of your emotional state. Snacking in the afternoon could help break up the monotony of the day if you're bored. Similarly, going outside for a smoke break could help you socialize with coworkers if you feel lonely.
The key here is understanding why you engage in these habits simultaneously daily. Once you grasp the underlying reasons, finding a new habit to fill that void becomes easier. Additionally, replacing bad habits rather than simply eliminating them is more effective.
How to Benefit from Time?
Time-based cues are another useful tool for maintaining routines over time. This is my preferred method. For example, writing a new article every Monday and Thursday. This pattern is triggered by the time and date.
It doesn't matter if I feel satisfied or frustrated with the article, nor does the article's length matter. What's crucial is sticking to the schedule because time triggers the habit loop.
2. Second Cue: Location
If you have ever walked into the kitchen and devoured a plate of freshly baked cookies simply because they are there, then you understand the power of location on our behavior.
I believe that location—the environment—is the most powerful trigger of both good and bad habits, especially on a smaller scale. Our habits and actions are often simply responses to the surrounding environment.
The famous study comparing water consumption to soft drink consumption is a clear example of the environment's influence on our behavior. It either reinforces positive habits or leads us toward negative ones.
However, location-based cues don't always have to be something we react to; they can also be something we intentionally create.
David Neal and Wendy Wood of Duke University have shown in numerous studies that forming new habits is easier in new places.
According to one theory, we mentally link habits to specific locations. This implies that all of the familiar locations you are in, like your house, workplace, etc., are connected to the habits and behaviors you've cultivated over time.
You must get past the mental cues connected to these familiar locations to form new habits there. Creating a new habit in an unfamiliar location is like starting over with no past triggers to deal with.
How to Benefit from Location?
When I arrive at the gym, I head to the same location each time to prepare. I put on my workout clothes and warm up. This consistent location within the gym serves as a simple cue for my exercise routine.
It helps motivate me to perform my ingrained actions before the workout. Of course, there are days when I don't feel like exercising, but relying on the location-based trigger helps me overcome that resistance and engage in my workout environment with minimal effort.
3. Third Cue: Preceding Event
Many habits are reactions to something else happening in your life. For example, when your phone rings, you check your text messages, or when the Facebook app's small notification bar lights up, you browse notifications. These behaviors are habits brought on by preceding events, which are one of the most beneficial cues when building new habits.
How to Benefit from Preceding Events?
Once you understand habit stacking, you can develop various methods to link new habits to preceding events. For example, ‘When I prepare my morning coffee, I take a one-minute moment of meditation.’
4. Fourth Cue: Emotional State
In my experience, emotional states often reflect bad habits. For example, you may have become used to eating when you're sad or shopping online when bored. Emotional states of depression or boredom serve as triggers for these negative habits.
Unfortunately, while emotions are common reflections of our behavior, I find it challenging to control them and leverage them to build good habits. Usually, this is because you must be conscious of the emotion you're experiencing to trigger positive habits.
In other words, you need to be both emotional and conscious simultaneously. This can be difficult, as attention is a powerful way to build better habits, but it is also challenging to apply.
How to Benefit from Emotional State?
I work hard to become more adept at handling stressful situations and tiredness. So, when I notice tension, I use this emotional state to trigger my deep breathing habit.
I like to follow the 3-1-5 breathing pattern: Inhale for 3 seconds, hold for 1 second, and exhale for 5 seconds. I repeat this sequence three to five times. This simple exercise is an excellent way to instantly relieve stress, and it’s highly practical because it can be done anywhere.
5. Fifth Cue: Your Relationship with Others
You might not be surprised to learn that the people you surround yourself with influence your habits and behaviors. However, you might be astonished by the magnitude of this impact. One study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that if your friend becomes overweight, your likelihood of becoming overweight increases by 57%, even if your friend lives hundreds of miles away.
Therefore, surrounding yourself with people with the habits you want to adopt is the best way to make the most of this information. “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with,” as Jim Rohn famously stated.
How to Benefit from Your Relationship with Others?
Even though I'm not a smoker, I've found that when I go out with friends, I smoke more even though I'm not really in the mood to. Why do I do that? It's just a reaction to the people and surroundings I'm in right now.
Before Choosing a Habit Cue
Whatever cue you decide on to form your new habit, it's important to realize this: Choosing a trigger that is both highly specific and immediately actionable is essential to creating a successful cue. For example, let's say you want to develop the daily habit of performing ten push-ups during lunch. To get started, you could decide on a time-based cue and say something like, "Every day during my lunch break, I will perform ten push-ups." This may work, but it could be more precise. Will you start your lunchtime workout with some push-ups? Or in the conclusion? Or exactly when?
Instead, consider creating a cue tied to a specific preceding event around lunchtime. For example, “When I close my laptop to go have lunch, I will do ten push-ups.”
In this case, this highly specific action of “closing the laptop” is the perfect trigger for what needs to happen next (the ten push-ups), ensuring that you won’t miss practicing your new habit at the appropriate time.
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