How to Develop a New Healthy Habit or Kick a Bad One

Have you ever heard of the path of least resistance?

As humans, we are automatically programmed to choose the path of least resistance.

So, when you’re deciding what you want your brain to memorize, you want to make sure that all choices are good choices. Otherwise, your automatic behaviors have a strong possibility of being negative.

Your subconscious mind will always choose the path to least resistance. What I just said is critical to remember because what I’m about to say is shocking.

Only 5% of our choices are consciously selected. Five percent! That means that 95% of our behaviors are habitual. Profound, huh?

To create lasting habit change, one must first understand the brain and the way that it works.

We have “three brains.”

Our first brain is: The Brainstem, otherwise known as “the critter brain.”

The Critter Brain is in charge of your physical being.

Your physical being includes your heart rate, blood sugar, and breathing. Your brain stem is continuously recording your entire neurological system and categorizing it in terms of risk versus safety. This brain, your brain stem/critter brain, cannot stand change.

Your critter brain gets automatically set in what it knows keeps safety, belonging, and love in tact..this is why we have patterns. Patterns repeat themselves. Why? To your critter brain, if you’ve survived something once, that experience is worth repeating because you didn’t die the first time. So, your critter brain says: “let’s keep doing that- even if it’s not something you want to experience or do again. So, anything new gets coded as “unfamiliar = risky = unsafe.”

Our second brain to develop was the Limbic System.

Our limbic system is concerned with emotions. It uses emotions to establish feelings of well being and safety. It’s these emotions that drive us away from or towards experiences that affect safety, belonging, and love.

The third brain to develop was the Cortex or the “human brain.”

This part of your brain deals with the logical, human conscious mind. Our conscious mind is the part of us that makes meaning out of our experiences.

When developing new healthy habits or kicking old ones, your critter brain says, “Don’t change! I don’t like the unknown.” Your limbic system is loaded with skepticism and fear.

Your cortex tries to make sense of these feelings and tries to come up with a reason to justify your critter brain slamming on the brakes.

You will not get any results in lasting habit change until all 3 of your brains give you a green light.

Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit, says that the brain can almost completely shut down...and this is a real advantage, because it means you have all of this mental activity you can devote to something else. That's why it's easy — while driving or parallel parking, let's say — to completely focus on something else: like the radio, or a conversation you're having. "You can do these complex behaviors without being mentally aware of it at all," Duhigg says. "And that's because of the capacity of our basal ganglia: to take a behavior and turn it into an automatic routine.”

Studies have shown that people will perform automated behaviors like putting your shoes on or brushing your hair— the same way, every single time IF they’re consistently in the same environment. Why is this? Your daily cues are there, which keeps your behaviors automated.

How do we solve this cycle of automated behaviors? The answer to this question is simple: when your environment is changed.

The best time to develop a new healthy habit or kick an old negative habit is on vacation. This is because once the cues change, the patterns are broken up, which then allows your brain to form a new pattern that will enable you to carry this new healthy habit into your daily life.

We integrate new healthy habits into our lives whenever we travel to a new place, currently every two months. During these two months, we each adopt a new healthy habit. This amount of time makes it very doable to get the new healthy habit to stick. This is because, with strong accountability, support, and motivation, it typically takes only 21 days to successfully develop a new healthy habit or kick a bad one. However, According to Phillippa Lally, a health psychology researcher at University College London, a new habit usually takes a little more than two months--66 days to be exact. Reading this study wasn't all that shocking to me, as I feel like this is because most people do not have a robust support system. I feel like many people lack discipline due to not having a cheerleader on the sidelines helping them along.

Forming a new habit or kicking an old one is no walk in the park. It takes commitment and discipline. A new good habit won’t get formed or disappear (if it’s a bad one) on its own. For that reason, you have to decide why and how important is this habit to you. Ask yourself these three questions:

1. How will this habit impact your relationships?

2. How will this habit help you achieve your goals?

3. How will this make your day different?

After you answer these questions, you have to develop a way to translate your answers into an emotionally captivating language. By doing so, you are creating a new “narrative” of who you are. What I mean by this is: you are giving life to your new habit. By doing this, you are making it very real.

Your subconscious hears everything you say to yourself- what you say to yourself matters. I’ll provide you with an example.

Let’s say that you are not a morning person. You sleep in every single day, and your relationships suffer because of it. You suffer because of it. You’re late for meetings. You drop your kids off late to school every day. You name it, you and everyone else in your life suffer. Let’s say a few of your friends go to a sunrise yoga class 3 days a week, and they all want you to go, but you never once have, because you’re “not a morning person.”

Now, you want to develop a new healthy habit of waking up early. “I am a morning person. I love waking up early. I want to get on the circadian rhythm cycle because it’s healthiest. It’s healthiest for me, my psyche, and my relationships.” Start saying these things aloud to yourself every morning and night before bed, even if you don’t believe them while speaking them.

As I said before, your subconscious hears everything you say.

These mental images of you being a morning person will become the psychological glue that will hold you and your new habit together.

The stronger your reasons are for this new habit, the more quickly you will acquire it. So, stop saying you’re not a morning person. I promise you, as time passes, your subconscious will believe that you are indeed a morning person.

Lastly, to get this new healthy habit to stick or kick that lousy habit successfully, you will need to hold yourself accountable. In other words, you need to be your own best friend.

You have to encourage yourself to stay on track and remind yourself of how far you’ve come. You got this! Tell yourself that, repeatedly. Use Post-its to write encouraging self-talk on and place them throughout your house or all over your bathroom mirror.

I firmly believe everyone needs an external force to coach them along in order to have true, lasting success. As a dually certified living and health coach, I am a master in habit change. I don’t charge anything for the first month; I want you to see value from what you’re receiving from me. When the 2nd month rolls around, you will start paying monthly if you wish to continue working with me.

I provide a “white glove” service, meaning I am with you every step of the way. I will be your greatest advocate and support.

I will cheer you along and help you eliminate all that negative self-talk that stops you from being the best version of yourself- professionally, relationally, and personally. I will give you recommendations that are specifically tailored to your needs to live your best life.

Want to lose that stubborn weight that you’ve tried to lose for years but can’t seem to get or keep it off? I’ve got you.

Are you struggling to kick those bad habits? I’ve got you.

Are you struggling to feel heard at work? I’ve got you.

Do you find yourself running on autopilot? I've got you.

Do you live in your comfort zone? I'll teach you how to break your comfort zone.

You name it; I will be your support system, guiding you along each step of the way.

I can help you tweak things; we call them “needle movers”- meaning tiny changes that, over time, lead to lasting changes, resulting in being the most successful, happy, healthy version of your self.

If you're interested in working with me, click here. I offer the first month of coaching to all of my clients for free. No contracts or cancellation fees. I look forward to being your coach and greatest advocate.

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