February 24, 2026 • 34 mins
Why is it so hard to stop oversleeping and eating candy? Why is it equally hard to start going to the gym and preparing healthy snacks? If you’ve been struggling with New Year’s resolutions, you’re not alone—turns out humans have wrestled with habits for centuries, like the guy who paid his servant to drag him out of bed in the morning. Will and Mango have the answers you need, with a little help from behavior change expert Dr. Katy Milkman.
- Buy Katy Milkman’s book, How to Change, and subscribe to her newsletter, Milkman Delivers!
Remember, Monday, March 2 is the official 2026 Part-Time Genius Habit Change Fresh Start Day! Mark your calendars and let us know what habit you’re trying to change. Call our hotline at (302) 405-5925 or email higeniuses@gmail.com.
Follow us on Instagram @parttimegenius and Bluesky @parttimegenius.bsky.social!
Photo by Timm Bursch via Unsplash. Thanks, Timm!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
You're listening to part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Guess what, Mango?
Speaker 1 (00:25):
What's that? Will?
Speaker 2 (00:26):
All right?
Speaker 3 (00:26):
I know you and I both love old ad campaigns.
They're so fun, so interesting. They're like a great sign
of the time. So I'm gonna go way back to
nineteen twenty eight for this one, and I'm talking about
Lucky Strike here. Lucky Strike cigarettes, of course, and they
launched this splashy new ad campaign. It was designed to
attract female customers. So the ad showed this young woman
with a chic flapper haircut, and under there was this
(00:48):
tagline and it said, to keep a slender figure, no
one can deny reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet.
And so the campaign was the brainchild of this Lucky
Strike president. His name was George Washington Hill, and he'd
been trying to figure out a way to combat the
stigma against women smoking in public. And this was his
big idea, encouraging weight conscious women to curb their appetite
(01:08):
for sweets by taking up a new habit smoking.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Which is probably a little worse for you, I mean
just eating some candy, right, I guess so, But it's
an interesting social experiment to see if you can get
them to put down one thing for another.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
And you know, today, honestly, we're of course horrified by
these ads, but back then they were really effective. So
Lucky Strike sales soared more than two hundred percent, and
even proper society women began tucking packs of cigarettes and
their purses along with their lipstick and whatever else. But
there was one group of people who were outraged by
these ads. Can you guess who these people were?
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Doctors?
Speaker 3 (01:45):
No, no, this was the nineteen twenties. Make they loved
the cigarettes, so doctors were chain smoking. But I'm actually
talking about the candy industry. So they actually threatened Lucky
Strike with litigation for implying that sweets make you gain weight.
So intil the ads wound down, but marketing historians believe
that the single tagline led more women to start smoking
than any other promotional effort in history.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
And there's the reason I bring this up, Mango.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
It's that the whole campaign was based on the idea
that if you just make up your mind, you can
replace one habit with another. Now, this year, like every
New Year, a lot of folks celebrated by making resolutions
things like eating healthier, going to the gym, all that
sort of stuff. But the problem is changing a habit
isn't as easy as Lucky Strike wanted people to believe.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
It's really crazy to think that a tobacco company might
lie to us.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
It's just so surprising you're right about that. I mean,
if you can't trust Big Tobacco, who can you trust mango? Anyway,
all of this made me curious about the science of habits,
like how we developed them, why they're so hard to break,
and what it really takes to make changes in our
everyday lives. And because we're in the habit of tackling
tough questions around here, we found some answers, so let's
dive in. Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius.
(03:16):
I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my
good friend Mangesh hot Ticketter and over there in the
booth eating a salad with one hand while bench pressing
this enormous I can't even describe how big this barbell
is massive just using that other hand. It's our friend
and producer Dylan Fagan. I would say I'm impressed by
his commitment to fitness, but I'm also just confused by
how quickly he seems to be doing both things at
(03:38):
the same time.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
It's impressive, right, Yeah, eating and pumping, eating.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
And pumping so good.
Speaker 3 (03:45):
Anyway, today's episode is all about habits, and I wanted
to do this episode because I actually have a habit
that i'd like to break.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
I'm illa, let you guess again, can you guess what
it is?
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Well? First of all, I'm so glad that you have
a habit that you're trying to break, because I feel
like I'm trying to a million habits because I'm doing
the show on how to Live Longer and be healthier,
and I'm so bad at trying to start like a
million things at the same time. I keep track of them.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
It's not easy.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
But I mean I feel like for you, you are a
healthy eater. You run marathons half marathons. So maybe it
has something to do with like diet doctor peppers or dependent.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
You know me so well, and I have talked about
this on the show before, but I do have a
bit of a candy problem, and you know, I find
myself thinking about candy, I inevitably find myself eating candy.
So I need to break my candy habit, and I'm
thinking maybe I could replace it with a better habit.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So probably not a cigarette, because I think we've established
that's a bad idea.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Okay, well, I guess I need to put that one
aside now. I was actually thinking more along the lines
of eating more fruit. What do you think about that one?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
I like that, And as you're thinking about, like infrasing
this new habit, it might actually help you to know
that you're definitely not alone. So people have been wrestling
with trying to implement better habits for hundreds even thousands
of years, and the meaning of the word habit has
evolved over time. So if you look back, Aristotle actually
equated habit with moral character, and he believed that good
(05:13):
character traits developed through a process of repetition or habituation,
and this is best done at a young age, in
his opinion, so you enter adulthood properly and prepared for
the moral life. He framed this kind of as a
learning by doing, so if you want to be a
brave person, you can develop that trait by doing brave things.
But he didn't see habituation as a mindless or even
(05:34):
mechanical activity. You really had to internalize these qualities and
think about them and incorporate them into your character. And
the idea was that those who developed good habits became
good and virtuous people, and that in turn guided all
their subsequent choices and it rewarded them with a happy life.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
I mean it sounds so much more noble than when
you think about like a lot of goals that people
will set or that will set, you know, like I
want to run on a treadmill three times a week
or something like that.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Like I just like the direction of this.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, but you can still see how we associate habits
with moral character, even though the modern definition of the
term has actually expanded to a whole bunch of things, right, Like,
so take exercise, for example. Someone might tell you that
you're being good for going to the gym, But just
because you're doing a healthy activity, it doesn't mean you're
a good person. And by the same token, like skipping
(06:21):
the gym doesn't make you a bad person. You're just
not getting those physical benefits of exercise. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:26):
Yeah, Well, as long as we're talking about morality here,
isn't a habit? Also, what nuns wear? Do we need
to shift topics?
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Here, yes, and weirdly, I did look into that, and
the earliest known use of the word habit in English
dates to the year twelve twenty five, and originally it
didn't just refer to nuns. It meant any specific way
of dressing associated with an occupation or an activity. That
use of the word has mostly fallen out of use,
(06:52):
except in the case of nuns, and weirdly, horseback riders
who still refer to a riding habit to describe their outfits,
which actually means a horseback riding. None could wear a
habit over her habit.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I actually did not know that about horseback riders. That's interesting,
all right. Well, I want to jump ahead to eighteen
fifty nine, which is the year a Scottish author with
an incredible name, Samuel Smile, published the world's first self
help book, which just feels so appropriate. And it was called,
wait for it, self help.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
It's a pretty self explanatory and I hope the book
was a little more creative than that title.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
I don't know, not really.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
It was a litany of these mid Victorian values like
self reliance and hard work, and you know, Smiles believed
in individualism, free trade and sort of pulling yourself up
by the bootstraps. And that's probably because he'd watched his
mother support eleven children on her own after their father
died in a cholera epidemic. And Smiles studied medicine, and
then he worked in business and in journalism, and finally
(07:51):
he started giving these lectures about self improvement. And was
he successful. Very so Self Help was a massive success.
It sold over quarter of a million copies by the
time that Smiles died, and it was translated into a
dozen languages. And much like Aristotle, Smiles saw habits as
an active reflection of character, so he wrote, quote, Man,
(08:12):
it has been said, is a bundle of habits, and
a habit is second nature. Principles, in fact are but
the names which we assigned to habits for principles are words,
but the habits are the things themselves.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
I like, how I realize you're saying man is in humankind.
But but at first it sounded like he's like, man, man,
it's a bundle of habits.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
That's right, Man, It's just I think maybe it was
supposed to mean both.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Yeah, but what was Smiles saying here?
Speaker 3 (08:40):
I guess and effect what he's saying is you know,
it's one thing to say I believe in hard work,
but the real value is developing a habit of actually
working hard. Smiles tells the story of a young man
named George Leclair who was born in a well off family.
He's lazy and he's unmotivated, and as a result, he
develops this habit of sleeping late instead of getting up
(09:00):
and being productive. So eventually he realizes how much time
he's wasting, so he vows to break this bad habit,
and he tries, and he tries, but he can't get
up on time. So he offers his servant, Joseph, a reward.
He says, if he manages to drag him out of
bed by six, Joseph would earn a crown, and by
this he means a coin, not like a royal headgear.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
So does Joseph make that money?
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Well, it certainly isn't easy for him. Joseph starts coming
in to wake up his boss at six, and George
yells and screams and threatens to fire him, so Joseph
SLINKs away and lets him sleep late again. I mean,
this is clearly an abusive workplace, but Joseph wants the
extra money. So one day he gets fed up, he
throws a basin of water at George. It finally gets
him out of bed on time, and from then on
(09:43):
he starts getting up early and starts working right after breakfast,
eventually becoming an author of several important books about the
natural sciences. So, according to Smiles, for forty years afterward,
the once lazy George got up every single day and
wrote from nine am to two pm, and again from
five pm to nine pm.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
And so all it took was a fed up servant
with a bucket of water and a tiny reward. Okay,
so we have to take a quick break, but when
we come back we'll find out the scientific reason why
habits are so tenacious and why going on autopilot is
actually a good thing except when it is not. Don't
go anywhere. Welcome back to part time genius and our
(10:39):
deep dive into the science of habits. Okay, Well, so
before the break, you were telling us about George Leclair
and the absurd lens he went to in order to
stop sleeping late. And aside from being a weird funny tale,
the story illustrates how sticky habits can be right like
this guy wants to wake up early, but he still
throws a tantrums. Poor servant tries to get him up
(11:01):
and change his behavior, and that brings us to the
great William James, who is the father of modern psychology.
James realized that the force of habit was everywhere, even
in nature, so in his landmark book The Principles of Psychology,
James describes the laws of nature as quote immutable habits
which the elementary sorts of matter follow in their actions
(11:23):
and reactions upon each other. And he also comes up
with a description of human habits that we still use today. So,
according to James, habits are sequences that we've repeated so
often that they actually perpetuate themselves. So in other words,
we no longer devote conscious thought or attention to them. Now. Obviously,
as in the case of George Leclair, we run into
problems when these automated habits like sleeping late, no longer
(11:46):
aligned with our goals. In his case, he wanted to
wake up early to write. But in general, James saw
the habit mechanism as a good thing. He believed that
shifting parts of daily life into habit mode kind of
frees us to think deeply about other actions and to
quote develop our higher powers of mind.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
I mean, it's kind of like how you hear about
CEOs who wear the same outfit every day. It's I
guess it's just like one less thing to think about.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
Yeah, I remember hearing about Obama doing that to sort
of store up his will power. But to look more
closely at this phenomena, why don't we take a look
inside your brain?
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Wait, my brain specifically.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
M So, let's welcome the audience in now. Let's say
you're home, it's late afternoon, and you walk past your
center for excellence, the candic cabinet, which we can assume
is never empty. Next thing you know, you've got a
piece of candy in your mouth, even though you aren't hungry,
and you made a resolution to eat fewer sweets. The
thing is, you shifted into autopilot without realizing it. And
(12:46):
the reason for this has to do with a group
of neuron clusters deep in your brain. They're called the
basal ganglia, and they're kind of like a control panel.
They connect with other parts of the brain to send
signals back and forth. And it's a complex and somewhat
mysterious reason that manages things like voluntary movement, decision making,
reward processing, and a whole lot more. But in your case,
(13:09):
seeing the candy cabinet was a trigger that activated a
specific brain circuit associated with the habit of eating candy.
It didn't engage the networks involved with goal focused action,
So your behavior and your resolution just kind of sailed
past each other.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
So by goal focused action, you mean like when I
consciously think to myself, like I want to do X,
and then I take whatever steps are necessary to then
do it right.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
But compare your autopilot experience to someone who doesn't eat
candy that often. Let's say they've had a tough day
at work and they decide they want a sweet treat.
The brain is consciously working through the steps, like they
identify this feeling, they decide to indulge. They remember where
they hid that box of chocolate from the kids, They
pull it out, pick the piece that looks the tastiest.
(13:54):
And the thing is this process also involves the basil kanglia,
but it's a completely different network than the networks associate
with habitual behavior. In other words, it's lighting up a
whole different part of your circuit board.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
So what happens if this person starts reaching for the
chocolates more often, Like, does the habit section of the
circuit board start lighting up eventually?
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (14:14):
It does.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So there are these researchers, Henry Yinn and Barbara Knowlton,
and they did a huge analysis of basil ganglia activity
back in two thousand and six, and one of the
things they found was that with repetition, the network's involved
with quote action control change. Right, so there's a handoff
from what they called the goal driven associative network to
(14:34):
the habit network. So you could be doing the exact
same action eating a piece of candy, but it's being
driven by a different part of your brain, which brings
us to a really important conclusion, Right, habits aren't defined
by what we're doing. They're defined by how we're doing them.
So if it's happening automatically without much conscious thought, whatever
it is is actually a habit.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
And I guess that's pretty cool, but maybe also kind
of depressing because I mean it sounds like you're saying
order to break a habit or gain a habit, we
actually have to rewire our brains.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
I mean, the good news is our brains have plasticity, right,
They are completely capable of change, learning and making new connections.
And even at my old age, and I know you're
a little younger than me, it just takes a little bit.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
Of effort, right, like two months, I think, you know,
the more I think about this, the more I think
it might be better if we had fewer habits, Like
wouldn't we make better choices if we did everything consciously
and actually try to avoid letting the habit network take
over in the first place.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Yeah, so I actually wondered about this as well. But
the thing is, we actually need both systems, both this
automatic one and this goal directed one, because they're not
completely disconnected. They work together in way scientists are still
trying to unravel. But over the years, research has shown
that William James was right, as are the CEOs who
wear the same outfit every day. Automatic habitual behavior helps
(15:54):
us act really quickly and it doesn't use up a
lot of cognitive resource, and that really does do give
our brains more bandwidth for navigating new and complex situations
or even things like emergencies. Imagine how exhausting it would
be if every morning you had to think about walking
into the bathroom picking up your toothbrush, uncapping the toothpaste,
applying the paste, putting the cap back on the toothpaste. Right,
(16:16):
you have to brush, you have to rinse, you have
to put the toothbrush away. You need a nap before
you're like, you even made it to the breakfast table.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
That just made me tired. Here and you describe it.
I realized how much work we're doing. But actually, you
know what it makes me think of is driving. Like
there are certain routes that I take all the time,
and it's not that I'm not paying attention to the road,
but I'm not really watching for street signs or checking
the GPS. It just you just know where to turn
because you've done it so many times. And you know,
while I'm driving, I sometimes start thinking about an idea
(16:43):
for the show.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Or a meeting that I need to prepare for.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
But if I'm driving someplace new and I actually have
to think about it, you know it wouldn't be easy
to do that.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
Yeah, I was in LA for work and I made
the mistake of running a car. And honestly, if I could
not do that much thinking when I.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Was driving a round that foot for sure.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Let's head back in your brain for a minute, which
you know is familiar territory for all our listeners. Listeners now, plant.
So you are at home and you need to go
to the grocery store. You grab the grocery bags and
get in your car, and that triggers your basil ganglia
to activate the drive to the grocery store habit network. Right,
So you start your car, pull out the driveway, head
(17:20):
down the street, and so on until you get to
the store. And this habit exists because over time, you've
been rewarded for doing it. When you get in your
car and follow a specific set of directions, you reach
your destination and your brain goes you know, ding ding ding,
I won right. So naturally, the next time you have
the same context and trigger, it has an incentive to
follow the same steps to get to that same reward.
(17:42):
But let's say something's changed this time. Right, So, yesterday
your neighbor told you that the road to the store
is closed for repairs. There is this other route, but
it means going ten minutes out of your way. So
what do you think happens when you get into your
car today.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
I mean, I want to think that i'd remember the
road closure and take the alternate route. But I know
this because it's actually happened to me so many times.
I have a feeling I just go the normal way,
then get to the roadblock, and then be annoyed with myself.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Right.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
Yeah, and actually there have been studies done about this.
It is super common and weird because we assume we're
these rational, goal oriented, reward motivated creatures. But even though
you've been told you need to take a different route
to reach your goal and earn this award of being
at the grocery store as quickly as possible, your habit
(18:27):
network kicks in and it overrides that knowledge and it
sends you the wrong way.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
Yeah, It's like sometimes you've ever been in like an uber,
a lyft or something like that, and you know that
the driver is going the slower way because they're not
following GPS or something like that, but it's the way
you know, they know they're supposed to go every time.
But anyway, I actually read this fascinating study that looked
at this phenomenon in the context of movie theater popcorn.
(18:52):
So these researchers named Windy Wood and David Neil, they
actually made a ton of popcorn and they just left
it sitting out in their lab for about a week.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Which must have made the lab smell incredible.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
I'm sure that it did. And I know what a
huge fan of popcorn you are. That's that sort of
your candy. But they didn't specify in this case. But
we all know popcorn is best right after its mate.
That stuff that set in the lab got really, really stale.
So Wendy and David hosted a movie night at a
local cinema. They gave out free popcorn. Half the audience
got a staleback, half got a freshly popped back, and
(19:24):
so when the trailers ended, they had people turning their
popcorn bags and they measured how much had been eaten.
They also asked everyone to fill out a survey indicating
how often they popcorn at the movies, and the results
were pretty incredible. So an average, people who were not
regular popcorn eaters ate about forty percent of the stale popcorn.
They started eating it, then they realized it wasn't very
good and they stopped. But people who were accustomed to
(19:47):
eating popcorn at the movies ate over sixty percent of
the stale bags. And the crazy part is Wendy and
Dave also asked people what they thought about the popcorn.
Everyone agreed that the stale stuff tasted bad, but the
habit it.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Still on out That is wild.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
And it's also amazing that, like, the people who weren't
regular popcorn eaters still ate forty percent of the stale popcorse. Seriously,
that's crazy, but you know it's proof of the power
of context and also triggers. Right, Like, some people only
eat popcorn at the movie, so being at the theater
is this powerful cue that it's popcorn time, even if
the popcorn isn't worth eating.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Yeah, that's true. But you know, there's actually one other
detail that I found interesting. So Wendy and Dave repeated
their experiment, and the second time they did it, they
told people they could only eat with their non dominant hand.
So this time, even people with the strong self reported
popcorn habits only ate about thirty percent of the stale
popcorn in their bag.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
And is that because it's hard to grab as much
popcorn with your non dominant hand.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
No, it's actually not really the takeaway, although some news
reports did get a hold of this study and claim
that eating with your other hand makes you eat less
but according to the researchers, using a non dominant hand
simply introduced an element of friction to the habit, and so,
in other words, people had to think about what they
were doing as they were eating, so it wasn't quite
as automatic as it was before. And when they thought
(21:07):
about it, they realized popcorn is gross. I don't want
to eat it, So their conscious brains overrode that habit mechanism,
which is wild. Wendy and David pointed out that the
opposite could be true as well, So slowing down, paying
closer attention to what they were eating could also help
us enjoy it more.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
But it's not going to make stale popcorn taste good.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
No, that's definitely true.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
All right, Well, after we take another quick break, we'll
hear from one of the world's leading experts on behavior
change to figure out how I can use these concepts
to tinker with my brain networks and modify my candy habit.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
So stay tuned. Okay, Well, so far.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
We've talked a lot about how habits form, why they're helpful,
and just how durable they become over time. But now
it's time to get into the real nitty gritty how
we can change our habits, and I actually found the
perfect person to explain it.
Speaker 4 (22:11):
I'm Katie Milkman, and I'm a professor at the Wharton
School at the University of Pennsylvania. I'm also the author
of the book How to Change, and I co direct
a research center called the Behavior Change for Good Initiative,
where we study the science of what it takes to
make change.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
It's funny too, because we spoke to Katie last month,
right after the New Year, and she told me it's
a busy time for her, like she gets lots of
media requests because everyone's trying to figure out the secret
to keeping their New Year's resolutions. And that led to
my first question, Is there any magic to picking a
date like January first as a time to make or
break a habit? And it turns out there actually is.
(22:48):
Katie refers to this as the fresh start effect. New
Year's Day is a classic example, but there are others,
like your birthday, or your first day at a new job,
or maybe why you want to go to the gym
on a Monday at the start out of a new week.
Speaker 4 (23:01):
All of these moments are chapter breaks in the way
we tell the story of our lives. And one thing
that's really interesting about humans and the way we think
about time is that we don't think about it linearly.
We think about it like we're characters in a book
and we're living through chapters, and at these chapter breaks,
we feel like there's a discontinuity in who we are.
So if you talk to somebody in the new year,
(23:23):
right after the start of January and they're talking about
something that happened to them last year, they have a
sense of disconnect. That was the old met last year
and this is the new me.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
And that disconnect helps change our habits. Yeah, it can.
It has to do with a general sense of motivation,
but also increased awareness of what we're doing. These chapter
breaks are a time to take stock and pay closer
attention to our behaviors, so we can break out of
that automation and really make a conscious decision about what
to change.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
You know, I wish somebody had told me this back
on I know, like December thirtieth or thirty first, right.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
Yeah, And I know you say that because I've spent
so much time in your brain this episode. So I
actually have a plan. I'm declaring next Monday, the official
twenty twenty six, Part Time Genius Habit Change, Fresh Start Day.
We are welcoming our audiences. If there's a habit you
want to make or when you want to break, just
mark your calendars. On March second, you have a blank
(24:19):
slate for change.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
And if you listen to this later, what we meant
to say was April second. So I actually really love this,
And on Monday, I'm going to start my new habit
of limiting sweets and eating fruit every single day. Man,
I'm never going to fail, and it's going to take
some will power, but I'm going to be really disciplined
and I'm going to do it.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Ah.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
I like that spirit, but I think you're wrong.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
Well, what do you mean wrong?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Let's let Katie explain.
Speaker 4 (24:43):
Nike has some great advertising and they're just do it campaign,
but it is one of my least favorite slogans because
it's so misaligned with what research shows. It's not that
we can just do it, it's that we actually need
to set ourselves up for success and not try to
push through the pain or you know what doesn't till
he makes you stronger. Those messages are really misaligned with
what evidence shows works, which is not to think I'm
(25:07):
going to just buckle down and use my willpower to
achieve this, But rather, how can you make it incredibly easy,
incredibly fun and rewarding and instantly gratifying and social and
unforgettable to pursue your goals.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
You're saying, I don't need to suffer.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
No, And in fact, the more you suffer, the harder
it is for new habits to take root. So remember
how we talked about how reward followed by repetition is
what locks habit patterns into your brain. If every time
you reach for an apple you think I don't want this,
your brain never registers it as a reward, and that
makes you less likely to repeat the behavior, and that
(25:42):
makes the habit less likely to.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Form some weird mental jiu jitsu mango. So you can
turn something you don't like doing into a habit if
you turn it into something that you like doing well.
In my case, maybe instead of buying the usual apples,
oranges or bananas, I guess I could buy some fancier
fruits that maybe I would enjoy even more. And maybe
instead of just eating at my desk while I'm answering emails,
(26:04):
I could take a few minutes for like a real break,
walk around and enjoy the fruit.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
Yeah, I like that fancy fruit break. You're taking. Fancy
fruit break, Katie also told me. Katie also told me
about a concept she calls temptation bundling, where you link
a desired habit with a different reward. Like when she
was crazy busy with postgrad work, she developed a gym
habit by making a rule she could only listen to
her favorite audiobooks when she was working out.
Speaker 4 (26:32):
I'd throw on my exercise clothes in the dead of
Boston winter and basically rush over to the gym to
find out what happened to my favorite characters. The other
thing that was amazing is not only did it motivate
me to go, but I didn't really notice the pain
of the workout while I was there. But it could
be anything any chore, right. It could be you only
let yourself listen to your favorite podcast while you're scrubbing
the bathroom floor, or you know, cleaning your desk.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
You know, I hope there's somebody out there listening to
Part Time Genius exclusively while scrubbing the bathroom floor. It's
just a nice idea, all right. My next question is
how long does all of this take? Like I read
somewhere that it takes twenty one days to form a habit,
which obviously is an overnight but it doesn't seem too hard.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
That's not that bad.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Yeah, so we've all heard this twenty one days thing,
and it's actually a myth. It comes from a nineteen
sixty self help book called psycho Cybernetics, and it was
written by a plastic surgeon named Maxwell Maltz. It's not
clear where you got the number twenty one from, but
there is no evidence for this. There's actually no magic
number for habit formation because there is such a wide
(27:32):
range of behaviors that habits can be. But repetition is
the key. So something like going to the gym, you're
probably only going to do it once a day. But
if you're trying to develop a habit like turning off
the light every time you leave a room, you can
repeat that multiple times a day, so it might take
less time.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
To become a habit.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
But if you're worrying about slip ups, you really shouldn't
worry about that. Katie says setbacks don't necessarily stop us
from reaching our goal. In fact, she told me about
a study where people were told to go to the
gym seven days a week, but they had two get
out of jail free cards and they could use those
on any days when they didn't feel up to it,
and those people had an easier time forming a gym
(28:10):
going habit than people who were told to go to
the gym five days a week.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
No matter what, that's pretty interesting, all right, So you
focus on repetition, not a magic number on the calendar,
don't freak out if you have a setback, and build
some flexibility into the plan. Like this all seems doable
in terms of adding healthy snacking habits to my life.
But is there anything else I should be thinking about
in order to break that candy habit? It's pretty intense, Mango.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
So you mentioned it earlier, but when you were talking
about popcorn and that whole study, like friction could be
one of the answers.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Okay, of course, Like if eating candy requires more effort,
I'll have to think about it more and that gives
me a better shot at overriding the automatic habit. Actually,
it occurs to me that I have a literal candy
cabinet in my house, so walking past it is such
a trigger, Mango, like, it is so nice to open
that cabinet so I could put my candy stash in
a different cupboard where it's out of sight, or even
(29:04):
give I don't know, I don't want to say this,
mega b baby, give some of it away.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Don't say that. Don't say that, and I don't want
to say it.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
Nevermind. Take that out, Dylan.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
I'd probably eat less if I had to go to
the store every time I wanted a candy bar. And
I guess that's obvious, but it's true.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Yeah, those are great ideas. But if you do all
that and it stills I'm working for you. There is
one more thing you can try.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Here's Katie.
Speaker 4 (29:28):
Another strategy that's pretty well studied and that's a little
more dramatic, is to use what's called a formal commitment
device or a hard commitment device, and that is where
you impose a more meaningful cost on yourself for failing
to achieve a goal or continuing with a habit. What
do I mean by cost, I literally mean a fine.
So imagine putting money on the line that you will
(29:49):
have to forfeit if you stick to that bad habit
and choosing a referee who will hold you accountable.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Okay, so like a swear jar here exactly. And because
I I'm such a good friend, I volunteer to help
hold you accountable. If you want, you can venmo me
like a dollar every time you accidentally eat candy instead
of fruit, and I'm just here for you.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
I really hope it doesn't come to that.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
There's actually another level of this that Katie told me
about where your accountability partner donates the money to a
cause that you.
Speaker 3 (30:18):
Hate, like the Society to Eradicate Sweets or you know
one of those awful organizations.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
I mean, that is diabolical, Mango.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
But it is a way to overcome really tenacious habit blocks.
Because if you're giving money to a friend or you're
marking it for a charity support, that financial cost is
kind of the same, but the emotional cost is less.
You can tell yourself, well, at least I'm helping this
good cause, right, And it feels very different if slipping
up means you're supporting a cause you absolutely do not
believe it.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
I feel like that is like the nuclear option. But
let's check in a few months and see if we
need to go there. But I got to say, Mango,
I really appreciate how much effort you put into helping
me figure this all out.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
Yeah, of course, the obviously i'm your friend, but also
the research is clear that social support helps with habit modification.
So if anyone listening wants to help a friend who's
trying to change their habits, Katie says, you can do
that in several ways. You can volunteer to try something
new with them, you can help hold them accountable, and
you can use your social network to introduce them to
(31:18):
people who have experience with whatever it is they're trying
to do. But you said it's also important just to
be a source of positivity for people.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
One of the things that we know as a barrier
in some cases to goal achievement can be maybe I
don't believe in myself that it's really feasible for someone
like me, And so the messages that we get from
our friends matter. So you can think about the implicit
messages you're sending with your actions and the people you
introduce someone to, but you can also think about the
explicit supportive messages that build confidence.
Speaker 3 (31:48):
Okay, so you think I can do this, Mango, because
starting one day I'm swapping my candy habit for a
healthy fruit of healthy fancy fruit habit.
Speaker 1 (31:56):
I should say, well, I don't think you can do it.
I know you can do it, and if not, I'll
gladly take your money and do something terrible with it.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
That's excellent, all right.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Well for that, my friend, you deserve today's trophy. Congratulations.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
I will take it. And for everyone else who wants
to change a habit, remember this coming Monday, March second
is our official fresh start day, which is weird that
we didn't do it on March fourth because we were
supposed to March fourth towards something you want, but March
second makes a lot more sense to us here. Give
us a call at three O two four oh five
five nine two five to tell us what habit you'd
(32:34):
like to change, or you can send us an email
at high Geniuses at gmail dot com. That's hi Geniuses
at gmail dot com. You can also find us on
blue Sky and Instagram at part time Genius and we'll
have an update for you later this year to see
how Will's doing on that candy habit. Big thanks to
Katie Milkman for speaking with us. Be sure to check
out the links to her work in the show notes.
(32:55):
I want to give a special shout out to her newsletter,
which is called Milkman Delivery. I just love that. Thanks
also to Kate Horwitz who helped us out with research,
and to Anna Rubinova, who edited this episode. We will
be back next week, but in the meantime, from Will, Dylan, Gabe, Mary,
and myself, thank you so much for listening. Part Time
(33:27):
Genius is a production of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. It is
hosted by my good pal Will Pearson, who I've known
for almost three decades now. That is insane to me.
I'm the Utaco host, Mangeshatikular aka Mango. Our producer is
Mary Phillips Sandy. She's actually a super producer. I'm going
to fix that in post. Our writer is Gabe Lucier,
(33:50):
who I've also known for like a decade at this point,
maybe more. Dylan Fagan is in the booth. He is
always dressed up, always cheering us on, and always writing
hit record and then mix the show after he does
a great job. I also want to shout out the
executive producers from iHeart my good pals Katrina and Norvel
and Ali Perry. We have social media support from Calypso
(34:13):
Rallis if you like our videos, that is all Calypso's handiwork.
For more podcasts from Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or tune in wherever you listen to your
favorite shows. That's it from us here at Part Time Genius.
Thank you so much for listening
You're listening to part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Guess what, Mango?
Speaker 1 (00:25):
What's that? Will?
Speaker 2 (00:26):
All right?
Speaker 3 (00:26):
I know you and I both love old ad campaigns.
They're so fun, so interesting. They're like a great sign
of the time. So I'm gonna go way back to
nineteen twenty eight for this one, and I'm talking about
Lucky Strike here. Lucky Strike cigarettes, of course, and they
launched this splashy new ad campaign. It was designed to
attract female customers. So the ad showed this young woman
with a chic flapper haircut, and under there was this
(00:48):
tagline and it said, to keep a slender figure, no
one can deny reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet.
And so the campaign was the brainchild of this Lucky
Strike president. His name was George Washington Hill, and he'd
been trying to figure out a way to combat the
stigma against women smoking in public. And this was his
big idea, encouraging weight conscious women to curb their appetite
(01:08):
for sweets by taking up a new habit smoking.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Which is probably a little worse for you, I mean
just eating some candy, right, I guess so, But it's
an interesting social experiment to see if you can get
them to put down one thing for another.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
And you know, today, honestly, we're of course horrified by
these ads, but back then they were really effective. So
Lucky Strike sales soared more than two hundred percent, and
even proper society women began tucking packs of cigarettes and
their purses along with their lipstick and whatever else. But
there was one group of people who were outraged by
these ads. Can you guess who these people were?
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Doctors?
Speaker 3 (01:45):
No, no, this was the nineteen twenties. Make they loved
the cigarettes, so doctors were chain smoking. But I'm actually
talking about the candy industry. So they actually threatened Lucky
Strike with litigation for implying that sweets make you gain weight.
So intil the ads wound down, but marketing historians believe
that the single tagline led more women to start smoking
than any other promotional effort in history.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
And there's the reason I bring this up, Mango.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
It's that the whole campaign was based on the idea
that if you just make up your mind, you can
replace one habit with another. Now, this year, like every
New Year, a lot of folks celebrated by making resolutions
things like eating healthier, going to the gym, all that
sort of stuff. But the problem is changing a habit
isn't as easy as Lucky Strike wanted people to believe.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
It's really crazy to think that a tobacco company might
lie to us.
Speaker 3 (02:33):
It's just so surprising you're right about that. I mean,
if you can't trust Big Tobacco, who can you trust mango? Anyway,
all of this made me curious about the science of habits,
like how we developed them, why they're so hard to break,
and what it really takes to make changes in our
everyday lives. And because we're in the habit of tackling
tough questions around here, we found some answers, so let's
dive in. Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius.
(03:16):
I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my
good friend Mangesh hot Ticketter and over there in the
booth eating a salad with one hand while bench pressing
this enormous I can't even describe how big this barbell
is massive just using that other hand. It's our friend
and producer Dylan Fagan. I would say I'm impressed by
his commitment to fitness, but I'm also just confused by
how quickly he seems to be doing both things at
(03:38):
the same time.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
It's impressive, right, Yeah, eating and pumping, eating.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
And pumping so good.
Speaker 3 (03:45):
Anyway, today's episode is all about habits, and I wanted
to do this episode because I actually have a habit
that i'd like to break.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
I'm illa, let you guess again, can you guess what
it is?
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Well? First of all, I'm so glad that you have
a habit that you're trying to break, because I feel
like I'm trying to a million habits because I'm doing
the show on how to Live Longer and be healthier,
and I'm so bad at trying to start like a
million things at the same time. I keep track of them.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
It's not easy.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
But I mean I feel like for you, you are a
healthy eater. You run marathons half marathons. So maybe it
has something to do with like diet doctor peppers or dependent.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
You know me so well, and I have talked about
this on the show before, but I do have a
bit of a candy problem, and you know, I find
myself thinking about candy, I inevitably find myself eating candy.
So I need to break my candy habit, and I'm
thinking maybe I could replace it with a better habit.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
So probably not a cigarette, because I think we've established
that's a bad idea.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Okay, well, I guess I need to put that one
aside now. I was actually thinking more along the lines
of eating more fruit. What do you think about that one?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
I like that, And as you're thinking about, like infrasing
this new habit, it might actually help you to know
that you're definitely not alone. So people have been wrestling
with trying to implement better habits for hundreds even thousands
of years, and the meaning of the word habit has
evolved over time. So if you look back, Aristotle actually
equated habit with moral character, and he believed that good
(05:13):
character traits developed through a process of repetition or habituation,
and this is best done at a young age, in
his opinion, so you enter adulthood properly and prepared for
the moral life. He framed this kind of as a
learning by doing, so if you want to be a
brave person, you can develop that trait by doing brave things.
But he didn't see habituation as a mindless or even
(05:34):
mechanical activity. You really had to internalize these qualities and
think about them and incorporate them into your character. And
the idea was that those who developed good habits became
good and virtuous people, and that in turn guided all
their subsequent choices and it rewarded them with a happy life.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
I mean it sounds so much more noble than when
you think about like a lot of goals that people
will set or that will set, you know, like I
want to run on a treadmill three times a week
or something like that.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Like I just like the direction of this.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, but you can still see how we associate habits
with moral character, even though the modern definition of the
term has actually expanded to a whole bunch of things, right, Like,
so take exercise, for example. Someone might tell you that
you're being good for going to the gym, But just
because you're doing a healthy activity, it doesn't mean you're
a good person. And by the same token, like skipping
(06:21):
the gym doesn't make you a bad person. You're just
not getting those physical benefits of exercise. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:26):
Yeah, Well, as long as we're talking about morality here,
isn't a habit? Also, what nuns wear? Do we need
to shift topics?
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Here, yes, and weirdly, I did look into that, and
the earliest known use of the word habit in English
dates to the year twelve twenty five, and originally it
didn't just refer to nuns. It meant any specific way
of dressing associated with an occupation or an activity. That
use of the word has mostly fallen out of use,
(06:52):
except in the case of nuns, and weirdly, horseback riders
who still refer to a riding habit to describe their outfits,
which actually means a horseback riding. None could wear a
habit over her habit.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
I actually did not know that about horseback riders. That's interesting,
all right. Well, I want to jump ahead to eighteen
fifty nine, which is the year a Scottish author with
an incredible name, Samuel Smile, published the world's first self
help book, which just feels so appropriate. And it was called,
wait for it, self help.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
It's a pretty self explanatory and I hope the book
was a little more creative than that title.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
I don't know, not really.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
It was a litany of these mid Victorian values like
self reliance and hard work, and you know, Smiles believed
in individualism, free trade and sort of pulling yourself up
by the bootstraps. And that's probably because he'd watched his
mother support eleven children on her own after their father
died in a cholera epidemic. And Smiles studied medicine, and
then he worked in business and in journalism, and finally
(07:51):
he started giving these lectures about self improvement. And was
he successful. Very so Self Help was a massive success.
It sold over quarter of a million copies by the
time that Smiles died, and it was translated into a
dozen languages. And much like Aristotle, Smiles saw habits as
an active reflection of character, so he wrote, quote, Man,
(08:12):
it has been said, is a bundle of habits, and
a habit is second nature. Principles, in fact are but
the names which we assigned to habits for principles are words,
but the habits are the things themselves.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
I like, how I realize you're saying man is in humankind.
But but at first it sounded like he's like, man, man,
it's a bundle of habits.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
That's right, Man, It's just I think maybe it was
supposed to mean both.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Yeah, but what was Smiles saying here?
Speaker 3 (08:40):
I guess and effect what he's saying is you know,
it's one thing to say I believe in hard work,
but the real value is developing a habit of actually
working hard. Smiles tells the story of a young man
named George Leclair who was born in a well off family.
He's lazy and he's unmotivated, and as a result, he
develops this habit of sleeping late instead of getting up
(09:00):
and being productive. So eventually he realizes how much time
he's wasting, so he vows to break this bad habit,
and he tries, and he tries, but he can't get
up on time. So he offers his servant, Joseph, a reward.
He says, if he manages to drag him out of
bed by six, Joseph would earn a crown, and by
this he means a coin, not like a royal headgear.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
So does Joseph make that money?
Speaker 3 (09:22):
Well, it certainly isn't easy for him. Joseph starts coming
in to wake up his boss at six, and George
yells and screams and threatens to fire him, so Joseph
SLINKs away and lets him sleep late again. I mean,
this is clearly an abusive workplace, but Joseph wants the
extra money. So one day he gets fed up, he
throws a basin of water at George. It finally gets
him out of bed on time, and from then on
(09:43):
he starts getting up early and starts working right after breakfast,
eventually becoming an author of several important books about the
natural sciences. So, according to Smiles, for forty years afterward,
the once lazy George got up every single day and
wrote from nine am to two pm, and again from
five pm to nine pm.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
And so all it took was a fed up servant
with a bucket of water and a tiny reward. Okay,
so we have to take a quick break, but when
we come back we'll find out the scientific reason why
habits are so tenacious and why going on autopilot is
actually a good thing except when it is not. Don't
go anywhere. Welcome back to part time genius and our
(10:39):
deep dive into the science of habits. Okay, Well, so
before the break, you were telling us about George Leclair
and the absurd lens he went to in order to
stop sleeping late. And aside from being a weird funny tale,
the story illustrates how sticky habits can be right like
this guy wants to wake up early, but he still
throws a tantrums. Poor servant tries to get him up
(11:01):
and change his behavior, and that brings us to the
great William James, who is the father of modern psychology.
James realized that the force of habit was everywhere, even
in nature, so in his landmark book The Principles of Psychology,
James describes the laws of nature as quote immutable habits
which the elementary sorts of matter follow in their actions
(11:23):
and reactions upon each other. And he also comes up
with a description of human habits that we still use today. So,
according to James, habits are sequences that we've repeated so
often that they actually perpetuate themselves. So in other words,
we no longer devote conscious thought or attention to them. Now. Obviously,
as in the case of George Leclair, we run into
problems when these automated habits like sleeping late, no longer
(11:46):
aligned with our goals. In his case, he wanted to
wake up early to write. But in general, James saw
the habit mechanism as a good thing. He believed that
shifting parts of daily life into habit mode kind of
frees us to think deeply about other actions and to
quote develop our higher powers of mind.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
I mean, it's kind of like how you hear about
CEOs who wear the same outfit every day. It's I
guess it's just like one less thing to think about.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
Yeah, I remember hearing about Obama doing that to sort
of store up his will power. But to look more
closely at this phenomena, why don't we take a look
inside your brain?
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Wait, my brain specifically.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
M So, let's welcome the audience in now. Let's say
you're home, it's late afternoon, and you walk past your
center for excellence, the candic cabinet, which we can assume
is never empty. Next thing you know, you've got a
piece of candy in your mouth, even though you aren't hungry,
and you made a resolution to eat fewer sweets. The
thing is, you shifted into autopilot without realizing it. And
(12:46):
the reason for this has to do with a group
of neuron clusters deep in your brain. They're called the
basal ganglia, and they're kind of like a control panel.
They connect with other parts of the brain to send
signals back and forth. And it's a complex and somewhat
mysterious reason that manages things like voluntary movement, decision making,
reward processing, and a whole lot more. But in your case,
(13:09):
seeing the candy cabinet was a trigger that activated a
specific brain circuit associated with the habit of eating candy.
It didn't engage the networks involved with goal focused action,
So your behavior and your resolution just kind of sailed
past each other.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
So by goal focused action, you mean like when I
consciously think to myself, like I want to do X,
and then I take whatever steps are necessary to then
do it right.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
But compare your autopilot experience to someone who doesn't eat
candy that often. Let's say they've had a tough day
at work and they decide they want a sweet treat.
The brain is consciously working through the steps, like they
identify this feeling, they decide to indulge. They remember where
they hid that box of chocolate from the kids, They
pull it out, pick the piece that looks the tastiest.
(13:54):
And the thing is this process also involves the basil kanglia,
but it's a completely different network than the networks associate
with habitual behavior. In other words, it's lighting up a
whole different part of your circuit board.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
So what happens if this person starts reaching for the
chocolates more often, Like, does the habit section of the
circuit board start lighting up eventually?
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (14:14):
It does.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So there are these researchers, Henry Yinn and Barbara Knowlton,
and they did a huge analysis of basil ganglia activity
back in two thousand and six, and one of the
things they found was that with repetition, the network's involved
with quote action control change. Right, so there's a handoff
from what they called the goal driven associative network to
(14:34):
the habit network. So you could be doing the exact
same action eating a piece of candy, but it's being
driven by a different part of your brain, which brings
us to a really important conclusion, Right, habits aren't defined
by what we're doing. They're defined by how we're doing them.
So if it's happening automatically without much conscious thought, whatever
it is is actually a habit.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
And I guess that's pretty cool, but maybe also kind
of depressing because I mean it sounds like you're saying
order to break a habit or gain a habit, we
actually have to rewire our brains.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
I mean, the good news is our brains have plasticity, right,
They are completely capable of change, learning and making new connections.
And even at my old age, and I know you're
a little younger than me, it just takes a little bit.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
Of effort, right, like two months, I think, you know,
the more I think about this, the more I think
it might be better if we had fewer habits, Like
wouldn't we make better choices if we did everything consciously
and actually try to avoid letting the habit network take
over in the first place.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Yeah, so I actually wondered about this as well. But
the thing is, we actually need both systems, both this
automatic one and this goal directed one, because they're not
completely disconnected. They work together in way scientists are still
trying to unravel. But over the years, research has shown
that William James was right, as are the CEOs who
wear the same outfit every day. Automatic habitual behavior helps
(15:54):
us act really quickly and it doesn't use up a
lot of cognitive resource, and that really does do give
our brains more bandwidth for navigating new and complex situations
or even things like emergencies. Imagine how exhausting it would
be if every morning you had to think about walking
into the bathroom picking up your toothbrush, uncapping the toothpaste,
applying the paste, putting the cap back on the toothpaste. Right,
(16:16):
you have to brush, you have to rinse, you have
to put the toothbrush away. You need a nap before
you're like, you even made it to the breakfast table.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
That just made me tired. Here and you describe it.
I realized how much work we're doing. But actually, you
know what it makes me think of is driving. Like
there are certain routes that I take all the time,
and it's not that I'm not paying attention to the road,
but I'm not really watching for street signs or checking
the GPS. It just you just know where to turn
because you've done it so many times. And you know,
while I'm driving, I sometimes start thinking about an idea
(16:43):
for the show.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Or a meeting that I need to prepare for.
Speaker 3 (16:45):
But if I'm driving someplace new and I actually have
to think about it, you know it wouldn't be easy
to do that.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
Yeah, I was in LA for work and I made
the mistake of running a car. And honestly, if I could
not do that much thinking when I.
Speaker 2 (16:56):
Was driving a round that foot for sure.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Let's head back in your brain for a minute, which
you know is familiar territory for all our listeners. Listeners now, plant.
So you are at home and you need to go
to the grocery store. You grab the grocery bags and
get in your car, and that triggers your basil ganglia
to activate the drive to the grocery store habit network. Right,
So you start your car, pull out the driveway, head
(17:20):
down the street, and so on until you get to
the store. And this habit exists because over time, you've
been rewarded for doing it. When you get in your
car and follow a specific set of directions, you reach
your destination and your brain goes you know, ding ding ding,
I won right. So naturally, the next time you have
the same context and trigger, it has an incentive to
follow the same steps to get to that same reward.
(17:42):
But let's say something's changed this time. Right, So, yesterday
your neighbor told you that the road to the store
is closed for repairs. There is this other route, but
it means going ten minutes out of your way. So
what do you think happens when you get into your
car today.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
I mean, I want to think that i'd remember the
road closure and take the alternate route. But I know
this because it's actually happened to me so many times.
I have a feeling I just go the normal way,
then get to the roadblock, and then be annoyed with myself.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Right.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
Yeah, and actually there have been studies done about this.
It is super common and weird because we assume we're
these rational, goal oriented, reward motivated creatures. But even though
you've been told you need to take a different route
to reach your goal and earn this award of being
at the grocery store as quickly as possible, your habit
(18:27):
network kicks in and it overrides that knowledge and it
sends you the wrong way.
Speaker 3 (18:31):
Yeah, It's like sometimes you've ever been in like an uber,
a lyft or something like that, and you know that
the driver is going the slower way because they're not
following GPS or something like that, but it's the way
you know, they know they're supposed to go every time.
But anyway, I actually read this fascinating study that looked
at this phenomenon in the context of movie theater popcorn.
(18:52):
So these researchers named Windy Wood and David Neil, they
actually made a ton of popcorn and they just left
it sitting out in their lab for about a week.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
Which must have made the lab smell incredible.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
I'm sure that it did. And I know what a
huge fan of popcorn you are. That's that sort of
your candy. But they didn't specify in this case. But
we all know popcorn is best right after its mate.
That stuff that set in the lab got really, really stale.
So Wendy and David hosted a movie night at a
local cinema. They gave out free popcorn. Half the audience
got a staleback, half got a freshly popped back, and
(19:24):
so when the trailers ended, they had people turning their
popcorn bags and they measured how much had been eaten.
They also asked everyone to fill out a survey indicating
how often they popcorn at the movies, and the results
were pretty incredible. So an average, people who were not
regular popcorn eaters ate about forty percent of the stale popcorn.
They started eating it, then they realized it wasn't very
good and they stopped. But people who were accustomed to
(19:47):
eating popcorn at the movies ate over sixty percent of
the stale bags. And the crazy part is Wendy and
Dave also asked people what they thought about the popcorn.
Everyone agreed that the stale stuff tasted bad, but the
habit it.
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Still on out That is wild.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
And it's also amazing that, like, the people who weren't
regular popcorn eaters still ate forty percent of the stale popcorse. Seriously,
that's crazy, but you know it's proof of the power
of context and also triggers. Right, Like, some people only
eat popcorn at the movie, so being at the theater
is this powerful cue that it's popcorn time, even if
the popcorn isn't worth eating.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Yeah, that's true. But you know, there's actually one other
detail that I found interesting. So Wendy and Dave repeated
their experiment, and the second time they did it, they
told people they could only eat with their non dominant hand.
So this time, even people with the strong self reported
popcorn habits only ate about thirty percent of the stale
popcorn in their bag.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
And is that because it's hard to grab as much
popcorn with your non dominant hand.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
No, it's actually not really the takeaway, although some news
reports did get a hold of this study and claim
that eating with your other hand makes you eat less
but according to the researchers, using a non dominant hand
simply introduced an element of friction to the habit, and so,
in other words, people had to think about what they
were doing as they were eating, so it wasn't quite
as automatic as it was before. And when they thought
(21:07):
about it, they realized popcorn is gross. I don't want
to eat it, So their conscious brains overrode that habit mechanism,
which is wild. Wendy and David pointed out that the
opposite could be true as well, So slowing down, paying
closer attention to what they were eating could also help
us enjoy it more.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
But it's not going to make stale popcorn taste good.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
No, that's definitely true.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
All right, Well, after we take another quick break, we'll
hear from one of the world's leading experts on behavior
change to figure out how I can use these concepts
to tinker with my brain networks and modify my candy habit.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
So stay tuned. Okay, Well, so far.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
We've talked a lot about how habits form, why they're helpful,
and just how durable they become over time. But now
it's time to get into the real nitty gritty how
we can change our habits, and I actually found the
perfect person to explain it.
Speaker 4 (22:11):
I'm Katie Milkman, and I'm a professor at the Wharton
School at the University of Pennsylvania. I'm also the author
of the book How to Change, and I co direct
a research center called the Behavior Change for Good Initiative,
where we study the science of what it takes to
make change.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
It's funny too, because we spoke to Katie last month,
right after the New Year, and she told me it's
a busy time for her, like she gets lots of
media requests because everyone's trying to figure out the secret
to keeping their New Year's resolutions. And that led to
my first question, Is there any magic to picking a
date like January first as a time to make or
break a habit? And it turns out there actually is.
(22:48):
Katie refers to this as the fresh start effect. New
Year's Day is a classic example, but there are others,
like your birthday, or your first day at a new job,
or maybe why you want to go to the gym
on a Monday at the start out of a new week.
Speaker 4 (23:01):
All of these moments are chapter breaks in the way
we tell the story of our lives. And one thing
that's really interesting about humans and the way we think
about time is that we don't think about it linearly.
We think about it like we're characters in a book
and we're living through chapters, and at these chapter breaks,
we feel like there's a discontinuity in who we are.
So if you talk to somebody in the new year,
(23:23):
right after the start of January and they're talking about
something that happened to them last year, they have a
sense of disconnect. That was the old met last year
and this is the new me.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
And that disconnect helps change our habits. Yeah, it can.
It has to do with a general sense of motivation,
but also increased awareness of what we're doing. These chapter
breaks are a time to take stock and pay closer
attention to our behaviors, so we can break out of
that automation and really make a conscious decision about what
to change.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
You know, I wish somebody had told me this back
on I know, like December thirtieth or thirty first, right.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
Yeah, And I know you say that because I've spent
so much time in your brain this episode. So I
actually have a plan. I'm declaring next Monday, the official
twenty twenty six, Part Time Genius Habit Change, Fresh Start Day.
We are welcoming our audiences. If there's a habit you
want to make or when you want to break, just
mark your calendars. On March second, you have a blank
(24:19):
slate for change.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
And if you listen to this later, what we meant
to say was April second. So I actually really love this,
And on Monday, I'm going to start my new habit
of limiting sweets and eating fruit every single day. Man,
I'm never going to fail, and it's going to take
some will power, but I'm going to be really disciplined
and I'm going to do it.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Ah.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
I like that spirit, but I think you're wrong.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
Well, what do you mean wrong?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Let's let Katie explain.
Speaker 4 (24:43):
Nike has some great advertising and they're just do it campaign,
but it is one of my least favorite slogans because
it's so misaligned with what research shows. It's not that
we can just do it, it's that we actually need
to set ourselves up for success and not try to
push through the pain or you know what doesn't till
he makes you stronger. Those messages are really misaligned with
what evidence shows works, which is not to think I'm
(25:07):
going to just buckle down and use my willpower to
achieve this, But rather, how can you make it incredibly easy,
incredibly fun and rewarding and instantly gratifying and social and
unforgettable to pursue your goals.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
You're saying, I don't need to suffer.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
No, And in fact, the more you suffer, the harder
it is for new habits to take root. So remember
how we talked about how reward followed by repetition is
what locks habit patterns into your brain. If every time
you reach for an apple you think I don't want this,
your brain never registers it as a reward, and that
makes you less likely to repeat the behavior, and that
(25:42):
makes the habit less likely to.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Form some weird mental jiu jitsu mango. So you can
turn something you don't like doing into a habit if
you turn it into something that you like doing well.
In my case, maybe instead of buying the usual apples,
oranges or bananas, I guess I could buy some fancier
fruits that maybe I would enjoy even more. And maybe
instead of just eating at my desk while I'm answering emails,
(26:04):
I could take a few minutes for like a real break,
walk around and enjoy the fruit.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
Yeah, I like that fancy fruit break. You're taking. Fancy
fruit break, Katie also told me. Katie also told me
about a concept she calls temptation bundling, where you link
a desired habit with a different reward. Like when she
was crazy busy with postgrad work, she developed a gym
habit by making a rule she could only listen to
her favorite audiobooks when she was working out.
Speaker 4 (26:32):
I'd throw on my exercise clothes in the dead of
Boston winter and basically rush over to the gym to
find out what happened to my favorite characters. The other
thing that was amazing is not only did it motivate
me to go, but I didn't really notice the pain
of the workout while I was there. But it could
be anything any chore, right. It could be you only
let yourself listen to your favorite podcast while you're scrubbing
the bathroom floor, or you know, cleaning your desk.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
You know, I hope there's somebody out there listening to
Part Time Genius exclusively while scrubbing the bathroom floor. It's
just a nice idea, all right. My next question is
how long does all of this take? Like I read
somewhere that it takes twenty one days to form a habit,
which obviously is an overnight but it doesn't seem too hard.
Speaker 2 (27:10):
That's not that bad.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Yeah, so we've all heard this twenty one days thing,
and it's actually a myth. It comes from a nineteen
sixty self help book called psycho Cybernetics, and it was
written by a plastic surgeon named Maxwell Maltz. It's not
clear where you got the number twenty one from, but
there is no evidence for this. There's actually no magic
number for habit formation because there is such a wide
(27:32):
range of behaviors that habits can be. But repetition is
the key. So something like going to the gym, you're
probably only going to do it once a day. But
if you're trying to develop a habit like turning off
the light every time you leave a room, you can
repeat that multiple times a day, so it might take
less time.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
To become a habit.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
But if you're worrying about slip ups, you really shouldn't
worry about that. Katie says setbacks don't necessarily stop us
from reaching our goal. In fact, she told me about
a study where people were told to go to the
gym seven days a week, but they had two get
out of jail free cards and they could use those
on any days when they didn't feel up to it,
and those people had an easier time forming a gym
(28:10):
going habit than people who were told to go to
the gym five days a week.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
No matter what, that's pretty interesting, all right, So you
focus on repetition, not a magic number on the calendar,
don't freak out if you have a setback, and build
some flexibility into the plan. Like this all seems doable
in terms of adding healthy snacking habits to my life.
But is there anything else I should be thinking about
in order to break that candy habit? It's pretty intense, Mango.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
So you mentioned it earlier, but when you were talking
about popcorn and that whole study, like friction could be
one of the answers.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Okay, of course, Like if eating candy requires more effort,
I'll have to think about it more and that gives
me a better shot at overriding the automatic habit. Actually,
it occurs to me that I have a literal candy
cabinet in my house, so walking past it is such
a trigger, Mango, like, it is so nice to open
that cabinet so I could put my candy stash in
a different cupboard where it's out of sight, or even
(29:04):
give I don't know, I don't want to say this,
mega b baby, give some of it away.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Don't say that. Don't say that, and I don't want
to say it.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
Nevermind. Take that out, Dylan.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
I'd probably eat less if I had to go to
the store every time I wanted a candy bar. And
I guess that's obvious, but it's true.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Yeah, those are great ideas. But if you do all
that and it stills I'm working for you. There is
one more thing you can try.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Here's Katie.
Speaker 4 (29:28):
Another strategy that's pretty well studied and that's a little
more dramatic, is to use what's called a formal commitment
device or a hard commitment device, and that is where
you impose a more meaningful cost on yourself for failing
to achieve a goal or continuing with a habit. What
do I mean by cost, I literally mean a fine.
So imagine putting money on the line that you will
(29:49):
have to forfeit if you stick to that bad habit
and choosing a referee who will hold you accountable.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Okay, so like a swear jar here exactly. And because
I I'm such a good friend, I volunteer to help
hold you accountable. If you want, you can venmo me
like a dollar every time you accidentally eat candy instead
of fruit, and I'm just here for you.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
I really hope it doesn't come to that.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
There's actually another level of this that Katie told me
about where your accountability partner donates the money to a
cause that you.
Speaker 3 (30:18):
Hate, like the Society to Eradicate Sweets or you know
one of those awful organizations.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
I mean, that is diabolical, Mango.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
But it is a way to overcome really tenacious habit blocks.
Because if you're giving money to a friend or you're
marking it for a charity support, that financial cost is
kind of the same, but the emotional cost is less.
You can tell yourself, well, at least I'm helping this
good cause, right, And it feels very different if slipping
up means you're supporting a cause you absolutely do not
believe it.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
I feel like that is like the nuclear option. But
let's check in a few months and see if we
need to go there. But I got to say, Mango,
I really appreciate how much effort you put into helping
me figure this all out.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
Yeah, of course, the obviously i'm your friend, but also
the research is clear that social support helps with habit modification.
So if anyone listening wants to help a friend who's
trying to change their habits, Katie says, you can do
that in several ways. You can volunteer to try something
new with them, you can help hold them accountable, and
you can use your social network to introduce them to
(31:18):
people who have experience with whatever it is they're trying
to do. But you said it's also important just to
be a source of positivity for people.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
One of the things that we know as a barrier
in some cases to goal achievement can be maybe I
don't believe in myself that it's really feasible for someone
like me, And so the messages that we get from
our friends matter. So you can think about the implicit
messages you're sending with your actions and the people you
introduce someone to, but you can also think about the
explicit supportive messages that build confidence.
Speaker 3 (31:48):
Okay, so you think I can do this, Mango, because
starting one day I'm swapping my candy habit for a
healthy fruit of healthy fancy fruit habit.
Speaker 1 (31:56):
I should say, well, I don't think you can do it.
I know you can do it, and if not, I'll
gladly take your money and do something terrible with it.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
That's excellent, all right.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Well for that, my friend, you deserve today's trophy. Congratulations.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
I will take it. And for everyone else who wants
to change a habit, remember this coming Monday, March second
is our official fresh start day, which is weird that
we didn't do it on March fourth because we were
supposed to March fourth towards something you want, but March
second makes a lot more sense to us here. Give
us a call at three O two four oh five
five nine two five to tell us what habit you'd
(32:34):
like to change, or you can send us an email
at high Geniuses at gmail dot com. That's hi Geniuses
at gmail dot com. You can also find us on
blue Sky and Instagram at part time Genius and we'll
have an update for you later this year to see
how Will's doing on that candy habit. Big thanks to
Katie Milkman for speaking with us. Be sure to check
out the links to her work in the show notes.
(32:55):
I want to give a special shout out to her newsletter,
which is called Milkman Delivery. I just love that. Thanks
also to Kate Horwitz who helped us out with research,
and to Anna Rubinova, who edited this episode. We will
be back next week, but in the meantime, from Will, Dylan, Gabe, Mary,
and myself, thank you so much for listening. Part Time
(33:27):
Genius is a production of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. It is
hosted by my good pal Will Pearson, who I've known
for almost three decades now. That is insane to me.
I'm the Utaco host, Mangeshatikular aka Mango. Our producer is
Mary Phillips Sandy. She's actually a super producer. I'm going
to fix that in post. Our writer is Gabe Lucier,
(33:50):
who I've also known for like a decade at this point,
maybe more. Dylan Fagan is in the booth. He is
always dressed up, always cheering us on, and always writing
hit record and then mix the show after he does
a great job. I also want to shout out the
executive producers from iHeart my good pals Katrina and Norvel
and Ali Perry. We have social media support from Calypso
(34:13):
Rallis if you like our videos, that is all Calypso's handiwork.
For more podcasts from Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or tune in wherever you listen to your
favorite shows. That's it from us here at Part Time Genius.
Thank you so much for listening
Part-Time Genius News
Hosts And Creators
Will Pearson
Mangesh Hattikudur
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