Breaking the Habit: What It Takes and How To Do It

I'm going to talk about breaking a couple of things, literally and figuratively. First, I broke my finger. Like, really really broke it. Had surgery and a couple of screws put in to fix it all up. Typing and texting with any efficiency or ease was impossible. I'm beyond grateful for dictating software, but it wasn't pretty. It took longer, there were lots of typos and I had to say everything out loud - not great in a co-working space.

But something remarkable happened right away that kind of stunned me. I called and spoke to more people on the phone in a span of two to three days than I probably had in the past six months combined. It was awesome! I sort of forgot how much better talking to people on the phone was than texting or messaging through various apps. It was refreshing and I was sure that even when I could text again, I would keep up with calling people rather than texting.

Can you guess what happened though? I'll give you two tries, but I think you'll only need one. I became a texting machine again! Phone calls were a distant memory...

Well, fiddlesticks. What happened? I wanted to change that habit so badly! So, I did a little research to figure out how and discovered the "habit loop".

My habit loop was (Cue) wondering how a friend was doing or wanting to talk to someone. Then (Habit/Routine) I picked up my phone and texted them. I'd quickly get a response back (Reward) and then usually would continue in the loop for a while longer.

Apparently the key to breaking or changing habits is a replacement routine/behavior and a little persistence and consistency. Research is all over the place on how long it takes to make new habits or change/break old ones, but some studies say you can do it in as little as 7 days.  That sounded pretty good to me, so that's what I'm going to try. I even changed the wallpaper on my phone to the new loop image below to help disrupt the auto-pilot flow from "Cue" to "Routine". 

Weekly Challenge! Break, Change or Create New Habits

I'm starting this challenge today and want you to join me! What's a habit you want to break, change or create? Start small, be specific and practice the new routine for 7 days and see how it goes! For more info on habits, check out these two articles. Habits: How They Form And How To Break Them from NPR and The Science Of Habits from Psychology Today