Last year I made a commitment to run six days a week, every week. By the end of the year, I’d completed 312 runs covering 2,533 km. On average, that’s 57km a week or 8km per run. I had little prior experience with running and I’ve never been particularly fond of it.
There are different schools of thought on the topic of habit formation. Neuroscientists advocate repeated behaviour to help build neural pathways. The sociocultural perspective underscores the impact of the prevalent social norms and values in our environment and community. Behavioural psychologists emphasise the role of reinforcement and punishment as habit forming and habit breaking strategies.
What then are the key factors when it comes to habit formation and achieving goals? What role, if any, do motivation, the habit loop and the brain rewards’ system play? How can we create habits and commitments that we sustain on the long-run?
Some of the main reasons we break our commitments are the less obvious ones. If we want to achieve something, we often know what we should be doing. What we don’t know is why we’re not doing it.
Am I creating from a place of opportunity or a place of fear?
When we want to change something, we are, often unbeknownst to us, in either one of two mindsets – we’re either trying to improve it or to make it less worse. The difference is vast. When our mindset is that of making things less worse our efforts usually end up being futile.
When you aim to make things less worse, you’re essentially trying to create the best bad version of your life. The implication? Your life will still be bad, just a little less bad.
In other words, you’re working towards something negative – not towards something positive. And not only are you working toward something negative, you’re also putting pressure on yourself to work hard for it.
If your subconscious underlying belief is that when you accomplish your goal your future will be a little less unhappy – but still overall unhappy – it’s no wonder that putting a lot of effort into getting there isn’t very appealing.
What is on the other end of your goal, or a habit you want to adopt? Are you trying to improve your life or make it less worse? Are you creating in order to build something or to fix something?
What’s likely to derail me? Is this a matter of subtraction or a matter of addition?
Sometimes the determinants of success are actions that enhance the chance of success — sometimes they are actions that prevent the chance of failure. We break commitments either because we didn’t have enough stimuli to accomplish them or because something obstructed us.
Examining a particular goal with this in mind can help us see whether its success is contingent on more incentives or on fewer barriers. How much emphasis should you put toward enhancing the stimuli versus removing obstacles? For some projects the most important question for success is what will move them forward? For others, what will prevent them from moving forward. Which one is yours?
How will this enhance my life?
It needs to bring more pleasure than pain
Masochism and will power can get some people very far – but generally only so far. The habits we stick with on the long term are the ones that, when all things are considered, bring us more pleasure than pain. The ones that have a net positive rather than a net negative effect on us and our life.
Intrinsic alignment over external expectations
We know from scientific research that intrinsic motivation is more important than extrinsic motivation. Deriving meaning and satisfaction from your project is more important than your boss’s expectations of you. We are more likely to adhere to new practices when we find them personally rewarding and satisfying — when we feel that they, overall, contribute positively to our life.
Before you adopt a habit or begin a new project, it is helpful to list all the reasons why the commitment is important to you. How will it enhance your life? What aspects of your life will it contribute to? Considering what you’ll have to give up in order to sustain this commitment, how will it have a more positive than a more negative impact on your life?
What are my competing commitments?
We choose, all the time. And every time we choose something, we unchoose everything else. Often the reason we don’t adhere to a commitment is because it clashes with another commitment. Researchers Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey refer to this dynamic as competing commitments and according to them it competing commitments are the root of our immunity to change. Someone’s commitment to exercising may be clashing with their commitment to a new work project – not just because of the time differential but also because after exercising they have less energy to invest into their work. Your commitment to get a promotion at work may be clashing with a commitment to spend more time with your family. Is your goal or habit clashing with any of your other commitments?
Who am I for myself that this is important for me?
Our actions are a perfect extension of who we are for ourselves. We are a perspective. We think ourselves into being. Our perspective of ourselves gives rise to our thoughts and feelings. Our thoughts and feelings give rise to our choices and actions. Our actions create our results.
Perspective of self > Thoughts and feelings > Choices and actions > Results
The reason why we don’t stick with certain commitments is because they clash with who we fundamentally are for ourselves. The main reason we don’t stick with certain habits is because we have a deeper-seated commitment to a perspective of ourselves that clashes with that habit. The biggest challenge is that this conflicting commitment is often a blind spot for us.
An entrepreneur may be committed to growing their business but if they fundamentally believe that they always fail, this belief will drive their actions because they’re trying to protect themselves from it. That’s why they may find themselves not promoting their work, not releasing new products, not connecting with people.
When our subconscious and conscious clash, the subconscious overwrites the conscious. If you’ve been struggling to start the new business, to accomplish the goal, to build the habit that’s because there’s a potential threat associated with your success. What fear does the future you’re trying to achieve hold? And who are you for yourself that gives rise to that fear?
Success, achieving our goals, setting and sustaining new habits and commitments is not about the right strategies and tools, but about the person who’s using them. Looking below the surface level of our goals, projects and ourselves to understand what motivates and drives our behaviour, and who we fundamentally are for ourselves, is the most important factor for success.