Each day our objective is to grow more, do more, be more. We do a lot of things on a daily basis, sometimes without even putting in any mental effort whatsoever.
We call these habits. Each of us have some habits that work in our favour. The automaticity of habits are not clearly understood by us. Wendy Wood calls this the 'Second-self.'
What is the second self? It is something we don’t necessarily control. And since we don’t have access to it. We prioritise and are influenced by things that we know, the choices we actively make. This is called the 'Introspection Illusion'. It is the brain’s tendency to focus too much on the information we know, experiences we have, our beliefs and values and reasons. It focuses too much on conscious material.
However, there are a lot of things we do that are out of habit and not out of choice.
It’s important to know that information doesn’t necessarily create a habit. We know things that are good for us. But don't do those things.
For example, People in the 1990’s did not know that they were eating fewer fruits and vegetables than recommended. A 5-day program made people aware of this. However, all that the program did was create awareness and understanding but did not create a habit.
A habit is a default. It’s what you do when you are not thinking, and you intervene on that with more conscious, thoughtful decisions. The habit system is part of the unconscious system. Now let’s look at the 5-day program example. Let’s say you had a habit of eating 1 fruit per week and the program tells you that you should be having 1 fruit per day. Your decision-making self will get in conflict with your habit self, stating that you are not following what you know is best for you.
How do you navigate between the ‘habit-self’ and the ‘decision-making self’?
On the one hand we have our habits to do one thing that we are not consciously aware of and on the other hand we have our conscious thoughts and feelings. In order to reach our goals, both of these have to be integrated. In order to be successful your habits and your conscious thoughtful self need to work together.
How can you do this?
When your conscious self realises that something needs to be done, let’s say – as mentioned above, eat 1 fruit per day instead of 1 a week, We need to practice and form new habits. Figure out an action plan that fulfils your goals and start practicing daily - to create a habit. Creating new habits is simpler than breaking old ones. Don’t penalize yourself or beat yourself up if you fail to keep up. Instead reward yourself when you keep up with your new habit. This triggers the happy hormones. Happiness creates more motivation than frustration and disappointment.
Successful people are made of successful habits.
Having an effective habit can set you up to do the things that you want in life and can integrate your habit self and your conscious self.
Successful people are not super human. They have just practiced and nurtured successful habits.
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