Here is today’s Game and what’s going on.
Here is what I discovered today in our Dadly Daily Declaration readings from Chapter 6 of Atomic Habits by James Clear. The title of this chapter is “Motivation is Overrated; Environment Often Matters More..”
Today’s chapter delves into how our environment triggers behavioral cues. Here are a few highlights from today’s readings:
- People often choose products not because of what they are, but because of where they are. Your habits change depending on the room you are in and the cues in front of you.
- Environment is the invisible hand that shapes human behavior. Despite our unique personalities, certain behavior tend to arise again and again under certain environmental conditions. In this way, the most common form of change is not internal, but external: we are changed by the world around. Every habit is context dependent.
- The more obviously available a product or service is, the more likely you are to try it. The truth is that many of the actions we take each day are shaped not by purposeful drive and choice but by the most obvious option.
- You don’t have to be a victim of your environment. You can also be the architect of it.
- Every habit is initiated by a cue, and we are more likely to notice cues that stand out. Unfortunately, the environments where we live an work often make it easy not to do certain actions because there is no obvious cue to trigger that behavior. When the cues that spark a habit are subtle or hidden, they are easy to ignore.
- By comparison, creating obvious visual cues draw your attention toward a desired habit.
- Here are a few ways you can redesign your environment to make cues for your preferred habits more obvious:
- If you want to remember to take your medication each night, put your pill bottle directly next to the faucet on the bathroom counter.
- If you want to remember to send more thank-you notes, keep a stack of stationery on your desk.
- If you want to drink more water, fill up a few water bottles each morning and place them in common locations around the house.
- If you want to make a habit a big part of your life, make the cue a big part of your environment. The most persistent behaviors usually have multiple cues.
- By sprinkling triggers throughout your surroundings, you increase the odds that you’ll think about your habit throughout the day. Make sure the best choice is the most obvious one. Making a better decision is easy and natural when the cues for good habits are right in front of you.
- Environment design is powerful not only because it influences how we engage with the world but also because we rarely do it. By altering the spaces where you live and work, you can increase your exposure to positive cues and reduce your exposure to negative ones. Environment design allows you to take back control and become the architect of your life. Be the designer of your world and not merely the consumer of it.
- The cues that trigger a habit can start out very specific, but over time your habits become associated not with a single trigger but with the entire context surrounding that behavior.
- We mentally assign our habits to the location in which they occur: the home, the office, the gym. Each location develops a connection to certain habits and routines.
- Our behavior is not designed by the objects in the environment but by our relationship to them. Stop thinking about your environment as filled with objects. Start thinking about it as filled with relationships. Think in terms of how you interact with the spaces around you.
- You can train yourself to link a particular habit with a particular context.
- Habits can be easier to change in a new environment. It helps to escape the subtle triggers and cues that nudge you toward your current habits. Got not a new place – a different coffee shop, a corn of a room you seldom use – and create a new routine there.
- It is easier to associate a new habit with a new context than to build a new habit in the face of competing cues. When you step outside your normal environment, you leave your behavior biases behind. You aren’t battling old environmental cues, which allows new habits to form without interruption.
- Trying to eat healthier? Try a new grocery store; it’s easier to avoid unhealthy food when your brain doesn’t automatically know where it is located in the new store.
- If you can’t manage to get to an entirely new environment, redefine or rearrange your current one. Create a separate space for work, study, exercise, entertainment and cooking. Use this mantra: One space, one use.
- Whenever possible, avoid mixing the context of one habit with another. When you start mixing contexts, you will start mixing habits…and the easier ones will usually win out.
Those gems lead us to today’s Dadly Daily Declaration:
Every habit should have a home.
Habits thrive under predictable circumstances. Focus comes automatically when you are sitting at your work desk. Relaxation is easier when you are in a space designed for that purpose. Sleep comes quickly when it is the only thing that happens in your bedroom (except for sex). If you want behavior that are stable and predictable, you need an environment that is stable and predictable.
A stable environment where everything has a place and a purpose is an environment where habits can easily form.
