Building Better Habits
Scott Miker
The systems and habits approach to improvement is a great way to gain control of your life. Using the techniques you learn how to design your life through systems and habits.
Most people disregard this because they want quick results. They sacrifice effectiveness for the immediate outcome. Unfortunately, most of the valuable aspects of life take time. You can’t snap your fingers to get instant change. It requires consistent action over time.
We all use habits already. Psychologists estimate that up to 95% of your life is habitual. This means that we don’t think about each step we take, we move out of habit.
This is great for us to accomplish much without overpowering our brain. But it means that if we didn’t design our habits, they formed automatically without our focused input.
As we make decisions, those start to form patterns. Those patterns turn into habit. So, if we choose to skip the healthy dinner to go out with friends once it doesn’t matter. But when we do it over and over again it becomes easier to do it in the future.
Building better habits means that we think through the habits and routines in our lives. We break them apart and use the systems and habits approach to improvement to rebuild them the way we want. We can make them more effective or more efficient. We can make them drive more healthy choices or allow more relaxation.
The key is that it becomes up to us. We control our lives and what we want to get out our limited time on this planet.
When we don’t build better habits, we allow them to form from recurring decisions and often those follow the path of least resistance. Instead of designing our lives to be what we want, we settle for what is easiest.
I encourage everyone to learn how to build better habits. This will unlock your life so you can get more out of it. If you want to be healthier, you can do that. If you want to have more freedom, you can do that. If you want lasting relationships, you can do that.
It becomes up to you to decide and then put in place the right habits to take you there. It is uplifting and gives a recurring sense of hope and control in life. It allows you to build your life according to what you feel is important and live the way you want to live.