Tiny Habits, Big Changes!
An Anchor For Your Goals
Most people have goals for goodness. Goals for better, happier and healthier. I actually can’t think of a person who doesn’t want better for themselves. But why does it seem like some of us are “crushing it” while some of us are stuck. Perception can be quite a stinker. The reality is most of us are “crushing it” with something and stuck somewhere else. It’s just “that person” is crushing it where we are stuck. While at the same time, we may not even realize that we’re crushing it where others are stuck. A smoker, who eats pretty healthy, may feel defeated around those who aren’t tempted to smoke, while a fitness trainer may feel defeated around someone who has no trouble giving up refined sugar. It’s very hard to anchor good habits when comparing yourself to others.
This is why your goals must become your goals factoring in the reality of your life. And the reality is, no goal or habit change happens overnight. Often we get very fanciful ideas about changing our habits based on self-motivation, suggestions from friends, and inspiring stories or movies. We get a grand “Rocky Balboa Montage” in our mind of what we can achieve. We feel it fully and believe we can do it and then… reality hits… life happens… and maintaining our well-intended plan becomes quite challenging. If this sounds familiar, take a deep breath! This means you’re a perfectly normal human being. You’re not a failure! You simply need to refresh your strategy.
The “Rocky Balboa Montage” approach to change, while inspiring, is not realistic. In BJ Fogg’s best-selling book, Tiny Habits, he refers to this as the Motivational Wave. He explains that big spikes of motivation have a specific purpose, but it is short lived. They serve to get our attention or achieve the need to do a really challenging thing, once. However, motivation ebbs and flows. Sometimes we feel it and sometimes we don’t. It actually isn’t enough to maintain and sustain a goal. So if you are relying on motivation to change your habits, odds are the habit will not take root the day the spark goes out. This is much like the honeymoon stage of a relationship. Attraction is strong, sparks fly, and you feel like you can see yourself “in love” forever. But as many of us have learned, lasting love requires a much deeper anchor for lasting commitment. The same goes with setting healthy goals.
I would like to share two of my favorite strategies for reaching goals in a realistic way. And I really can’t take credit for it. BJ Fogg is an expert in the area of habit change and offers a wealth of positive strategies when it comes to behavior change. I continue to learn from his research and if any of this inspires you, I encourage you to check out his work.
Favorite Strategy #1: Start Tiny
Starting tiny and building from there is natural. It does not shock our system and overhaul our life with such a drastic and overwhelming change. It gives us room to observe, learn, adjust and adapt. Mr. Fogg’s approach is simple, doable and meant to fit into your life. Fogg states, “The essence of Tiny Habits is this: Take a behavior you want, make it tiny, find where it fits naturally into your life and nurture its growth. If you want to create long-term change, it’s best to start small.” The truth is we often truly don’t know what we’re getting ourselves into until we’re doing it. When we start small we have freedom to examine the effects of the change we are trying to make and adjust from there.
Favorite Strategy #2: Anchoring
Can I just say I adore the strategy of anchoring. It is pure genius in my opinion! The idea of anchoring is simply this: you take your tiny habit and attach it to an anchor in your life. Yes, you have anchors! Everyone has anchors. Anchors are things you already do reliably and they don’t necessarily have to be perceived as good or bad. Just something you always do. One of Mr. Fogg’s best examples comes from his desire to start doing push-ups. The anchor he chose was flushing the toilet. That’s right… flushing the toilet. It’s something all humans do reliably every day. His tiny habit was to start with 2 push-ups after he used the bathroom. Overtime this tiny habit turned into him routinely doing 50 push-ups a day, and he continues the habit to this day. It may seem silly, but for many it seems to work. The recipe is this:
After I (ANCHOR)…. I will (TINY HABIT).
Some examples could be
After I start the coffee maker, I will hold 2 yoga poses.
After I take my break at work, I will eat a piece of fresh fruit.
After I brush my teeth, I will wipe down the sink.
After I walk the dog, I will start dinner.
After I clean up from dinner, I will launch my meditation app.
After my head hits the pillow, I will take 3 deep breaths.
While the idea of going “Rocky” with your habits sounds nice it’s not sustainable, because that level of change does not fit in with the habits you’ve already cultivated. Change takes time. When we try to do it all at once, something suffers. We burn out or we’re really not prepared to juggle it with the rest of life. It does not mean you’re a failure or not good at making changes. It means you need to go gently with yourself and allow time for the change to gradually grow and take root. It may not feel like much at first, but Rocky didn’t get to the top of the stairs in one leap. He had to work from the bottom to the top. You may not reach your big goal today, but if you can take a new step each day, in time you may find yourself celebrating at the top!
And hey, let’s not totally dis motivation. For kicks and giggles go ahead and watch our favorite boxer punch raw meat and crush it!
If you would to follow BJ Fogg’s work below is a link to his site:
