Tips on breaking bad habits - Los Angeles Times

Tips on breaking bad habits - Los Angeles Times

Note from Jim: Great advice backed by science.


Tips on breaking bad habits
By Karen Ravn April 6, 2009

Excerpts:


Don't leave a hole where a bad habit used to be. Sometimes substituting new, improved behaviors for old bad ones will help.
Choose wisely. If you try to replace a bad, old habit with a good, new one, make sure the new one isn't too unpleasant

Be risk averse. Habits are driven by situations. Figure out which situations are most tempting, and avoid them.

Get down to specifics. Sometimes you can identify triggers that are most likely to bring out your bad habit. These can involve people, locations or preceding actions

Practice. Practice. Practice. Here, there and everywhere. Studies suggest that you're at risk for a relapse.In general, a habit can be associated with many different places, people, activities, etc. -- and will stay broken only in the particular situations where you break it. So if you're trying to break a habit, practice in as many situations as you can.

Use cues and rewards to your advantage. Promise yourself a piece of your favorite candy once a week, but only if the rest of the time you don't indulge.


Follow through on your good intentions. Studies have shown that a simple "if-then" plan can make a big difference. In one study published last year, having such a plan helped one group achieve its goal of eating less of a particular snack food and helped another group achieve its goal of performing well in a tennis match.Participants in the eating-less group were given this line: "If I think about my chosen food, then I will ignore that thought!" and were told to say it to themselves three times and to commit themselves to acting on it.The tennis group was told to compose four "if-then" statements of their own and write them down. The statements were to be of the form: "If I feel angry, then I will calm myself and tell myself, 'I will win!' "Peter Gollwitzer, professor of psychology at New York University in New York City and at the University of Konstanz in Germany, says, "There's hardly any health behavior it doesn't work for."

Show how highly evolved you are. Suppose you procrastinate whenever you ought to be doing something you don't want to do. (Even if you want to break your procrastination habit, you may just keep putting it off.) The trouble is, procrastination provides instant gratification, and even though you usually have to pay, that doesn't come till later on. Fortunately, as we have seen, people have a unique ability to project themselves into the future. So remind yourself of that when you're tempted to work on your tan and put off working on your taxes.

Tap into your willpower. It's easy to succumb to old, familiar habits. But a 2007 paper published in the journal Emotion found that we can resist temptation more successfully if we consider it a test of will. What doesn't make you give up makes you stronger. If you fall off the wagon, don't quit trying. Studies (in rats, admittedly) suggest that occasional lapses don't make you more likely to fail in the long run.There's a tendency on such occasions to decide you've blown it and give up. But it's important to regroup. Habits are strong. But you can be stronger.

Read Full Article: http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-breakinghabits6-2009apr06,0,2419265.story
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This posting was made my Jim Jacobs, President & CEO of Jacobs Executive Advisors. Jim also serves as Leader of Jacobs Advisors' Insurance Practice.