James Clear is the author of the New York Times Bestseller, Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones.
In this conversation with James, you’ll learn:
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How to overcome a lack of motivation and willpower.
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How to make tiny, easy changes that deliver big results and will make you a better runner.
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The best way to break your bad habits and stick to good ones (like running!).
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How to get back on track when you get off course.
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And much more!
Click here to read the transcript for this episode.
This episode is brought to you by my beginner running plan, None to Run.
Cheers,
Mark
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
James, thanks a lot for coming back. I wouldn't say
(00:02):
come back on the show but it'sit's well, it's been about six
years. I just looked back on theprevious my blog feed and I
think it was 03/10/2013. Soanyways, welcome back and great
to chat again.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Yeah. Thank you. Good to talk to you as well and kudos
on the consistency and beingaround six years later. That's
great.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
I'm still around and obviously so are you. So first,
I just wanna congratulate you onyour your book that came out.
When did it actually come out?Was it October or?
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yep, October 2018. So it's been out for a few months
now as of us recording this.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yeah, so the book is called Atomic Habits, an easy
and proven way to build goodhabits and break Bad Ones and
I've read through it, loved it,recommended it to quite a few
people already and actuallywe're up skiing with my family
this past weekend and that thefamily we stay with, I walk in
the kitchen, first thing Inotice is a coffee on the
(00:58):
kitchen table.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Oh wow, that's good.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
So I was like, I'm actually talking to James on
Wednesday. So anyways, that wasthat was kind of cool.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
So
Speaker 1 (01:07):
anyways, I just want basically break our conversation
into three parts, three mainparts I'm thinking. First part
sort of being walk through somesort of the general principles
of the book, second part beingmaybe take you through a
scenario like what a typicalnone to run subscribers, sort of
their typical scenario andperhaps we can walk through and
(01:30):
maybe give some tips for aperson sort of in that
circumstance and with thosegoals. And then the last part, I
just got two or three questionsfrom some of my subscribers. So
I'd love to get to those if wecan and that's about it.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Yeah, great. That sounds perfect.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Awesome. So the first part, so some of the general
principles that I like and wouldlove to get you to give us sort
of a general tips and feedbackand guidance around those
principles would be awesome. Thefirst one being and this is a
(02:08):
overcoming the lack ofmotivation and willpower as it
comes to you know building a newhabit. Obviously you know
overcoming that inertia isdifficult for many. Want to do
it but it's hard, so what's sortof your general advice, thoughts
and tips around overcoming sortof a lack of motivation and
willpower?
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah, it's a good question. So I think first of
all, maybe to invert thequestion, don't really think
it's a good idea to rely onmotivation and willpower. And so
some of kind of my centralphilosophy and approach sort of
comes out of that, or maybe islike the other side of that
coin. So if if you don't havemuch motivation or willpower,
(02:47):
what can you manage to do? Well,you can usually only manage to
do small things.
And so if you think of, youknow, you sort of think of any
habit as maybe like a spectrumfrom very easy to very hard, you
know, so, like, doing one pushup is very easy. Doing a hundred
push ups might be very hard. Orin the case of running, you
know, putting on your runningshoes is very easy. Walking for
(03:10):
ten minutes is easy. Going for arun for a five k might be,
moderate or maybe a 10 k orsomething is hard, and a
marathon might be very hard.
Right? Yeah. So, a lot ofpeople, when they start, they
they say things like what youjust said, like, oh, I I really
want to do it. I want to run themarathon. I wanna be able to do
(03:30):
a hundred push ups, but there Ithink we don't even realize that
we're jumping so far down thespectrum.
Right? We're just, like,immediately thinking of this
ultimate finish line or outcomethat we want. And, instead, you
know, and this is one of thecore ideas of atomic habits, I
think it's much more useful tofocus on the easy portion of the
spectrum, to scale it down andfocus on the simplest action,
(03:52):
the first movement. So the kindof the practical answer to your
question, what do you do whenyou don't have much willpower?
What do you do when you feellike you're low on motivation?
I talk about a variety ofstrategies in the book, but I
think one good place to start iswith what I call the two minute
rule. So you basically takewhatever habit you're trying to
build, and you scale it down tosomething that you can do in two
(04:14):
minutes or less. So in the caseof, you know, running three
miles or something, that becomesput on your running shoes, or do
yoga four days a week becomestake out your yoga mat. Or read
30 books a year becomes read onepage. Something that takes two
minutes or less to do.
And you're you're really tryingto automate that first action,
(04:35):
that first movement. And I havea a story or an example that I
like to share from a reader ofmine. So he he ended up losing
over a hundred pounds, but oneof the first things that he did
was he went to the gym and hewasn't allowed to stay for
longer than five minutes. So hewould get in the car, drive to
the gym, get out, do half anexercise, get back in the car,
(04:56):
drive home. And it sounds sillyto people at first.
It sounds like, you know, sosmall as to almost be
ridiculous. You know? It's like,well, clearly, doing half an
exercise or being in the gym forfive minutes is not gonna be the
thing that gets you in shape.But what the key thing that he
was doing and what you realizeis he was mastering the art of
showing up. Right?
He was becoming the type ofperson that went to the gym four
(05:19):
days a week Mhmm. Even if it wasonly for a few minutes. And if
you don't become that kind ofperson, then you don't really
have a chance to be the personwho works out for forty five
minutes for four days a week.Right? Like, you you, I think
this is, you know, maybe asurprising and deeper truth
about how habits work and whatyou need to focus on, which is
(05:39):
that a habit must be establishedbefore it can be improved.
Right? Figure out a way to makeit the normal in your life, the
standard, before you worry aboutoptimizing it. And if you can
become that person who puts ontheir running shoes three days a
week or who goes to the gym forfive minutes, four days a week,
then you have a chance to be theperson who does the big
ambitious thing that's on thehard side of the spectrum. And,
(06:02):
so I think that's really mysolution for dealing with
willpower and discipline andmotivation problems is let's
scale it down to a point whereit's so easy, you feel like you
could do it 98% of the time evenif you had no motivation. And
then once that becomes yournormal, then we can start
talking about ways to upgradeand expand from there.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
I love that and that's so common. Mean, fall
into that trap, think everyonedoes. You start something new
and whether it's you knowrunning, cycling, playing the
piano, whatever and you'relooking for that improvement,
improvement, improvement whenyou haven't established even you
know the habit of you knowplaying the piano four or five
(06:39):
times a week. So yeah, that's socommon and I love that advice
that you just gave there. That'sin the book as well I believe,
right?
That story
Speaker 2 (06:47):
about Yeah, the two minute rule is maybe 75% of the
way through. It's mentioned inthere as part of making your
habits easy and convenient.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah and I think the story about the fellow driving
to the gym is in the book aswell if I remember.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Yeah, you know ultimately, what we're talking
about here is you want toperform a habit enough times
that you feel like it'sreinforcing being a certain type
of person, Right? So in the caseof you know, I mentioned this in
chapter two of the book, thiskind of concept of identity
based habits, that that truebehavior change at a certain
level is really identity change.It's really about looking at
(07:21):
yourself in a new way. You know,there there are a lot of people
who, when they start working outor they start going for runs or
whatever, it feels it feels likea lot. It feels like a
sacrifice.
It feels like it's not normal.It feels like it requires a lot
of energy and effort to do that.But there are also plenty of
other people who going to thegym three days a week is normal.
It's just it's it doesn't feellike a sacrifice. It's just
(07:42):
kinda what they do.
Mhmm. And I think that thatshift occurs once you start to
adopt that action as part ofyour identity. And so this is
why I I say things like, thegoal is not to run a marathon.
The goal is to become a runner.The goal is not to meditate for
twenty minutes every day.
The goal is to be a meditator.The goal is not to write a book,
(08:03):
it's to be a writer. Becauseonce you identify as those
things, I am a writer, I am ameditator, I am a runner. Well,
then it's like doing thoseactions does not require a lot
of additional effort ormotivation because you're just
acting in alignment with who youalready believe yourself to be.
Know, like, do I need to getmotivated to write?
(08:24):
Well, not really because that'swho I am. Right? I am a writer.
That's what writers do. And Ithink the so the natural
question follows from that, ofcourse, is like, well, if that's
true, then how do I get to thatpoint?
Right? How do I become that? Andthis is where I think we get,
you know, the loop closes and weget back to this kind of two
minute idea, which is you showup in small ways. You know? You
(08:45):
write a sentence each day.
And on the first day, maybe youdon't identify as a writer and
maybe you don't on the secondday or the twentieth or the
fiftieth. But at some point,maybe it's six months or twelve
months or two years later,you've been showing up every day
and writing a sentence. And soyou start to identify as, yeah,
I'm the type of person thatwrites every day. That's just
what I do. And, so I think it'sthat consistency in small ways
(09:08):
that sort of the way I like tophrase it is every action you
take casts a vote for the typeof person that you believe that
you are.
And so even when you're doingsmall things, one push up,
reading one page, meditating forone minute, you're casting a
vote for being a person whodoesn't miss workouts or for
being a meditator, for being areader. And, eventually, once
(09:28):
those votes accumulate and pileup, you start to actually
believe that that's who you are.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
You talk a lot about in your book and in your writing
about and this sort of leadsinto what you were just talking
to into this but making tinyeasy changes that deliver big
results and of making thecomparison to like compounding
interest or 1% changes that likemay not seem like a lot today
and over a month or so but inover weeks and months, they can
(09:56):
add up to a lot. Khasu, can youtalk a little bit about that?
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Well, habits are the compound interest of self
improvement and what I mean bythat phrase is the same way that
money multiplies throughcompound interest, the effects
of your habits multiply as yourepeat them across time. So you
know, you have money and you'resaving a little bit for like
retirement, well, you know, yousave a hundred bucks or
something, it doesn't reallyfeel like a whole lot. You're
(10:20):
like, well, I can't retire onthat, you know, like it's it
doesn't seem to make muchdifference. And that's
especially true in the earlydays, you know, you got those
early months, you're in yourtwenties and thirties or
whatever, and you're kind oftrying to accumulate a little
bit and save. And you're like,man, you know, this is gonna
take forever.
But then in the later years, youget a a decade or two in, you
start to hit that hockey stickportion of the curve. It starts
(10:41):
to compound in a surprising wayand, you know, you turn around,
you're surprised by how much theportfolio is growing. And,
habits are not exactly likethat. It's not it's not a
mathematical equation in thesame, you know, way. Mhmm.
But they man, they can feel likethat a lot of the time. And I
think what is true and what'svery similar between compound
interest and finance and kind ofthe compound interest of self
(11:03):
improvement is that the greatestgains, the greatest results are
delayed. And that's kind of acom a hallmark of any
compounding process. You don'thave a whole lot in the
beginning, doesn't seem likevery much, seems insignificant
at first, but if you keepshowing up, it really compounds
and takes off over time. And,you know, you can look at almost
any habit like that.
(11:24):
Reading one book today is fairlyinsignificant, doesn't mean a
whole lot. But a commitment tolifelong reading, well, that can
be transformative. Then you getthis kind of compound effect of
knowledge over time. Or, youknow, what is the difference
between eating a burger andfries for lunch or eating a
salad? On any given day, it'snot really a whole lot.
(11:45):
You know, your body looksbasically the same in the
mirror. The scale doesn't reallychange. But if you repeat that
habit for two years or fiveyears or ten years, well then
you turn around and you're verysurprised by, you know, oh wow,
those daily choices really wereadding up. So I think that
that's kind of the ultimatetruth or that that kernel of
truth about compounding andhabits, which is they can feel
(12:06):
insignificant in bothdirections, getting 1% better or
1% worse on any given day. Mhmm.
But if you can master thatlittle advantage, then you put
time to work for you rather thanagainst you. And so that's why,
you know, sometimes I'll say,like, time magnifies the margin
between success and failure. Itit multiplies whatever you feed
(12:28):
it. So good habits make timeyour ally and bad habits make
time your enemy and if you canmaster that and capture that
little 1% improvement each day,you'll end up surprised you
know, two or five or ten yearslater at where you're at.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
I love that. Breaking bad habits versus sticking or
starting good habits, is there adifference in the approach to
breaking habit versus startingor sticking to a good habit?
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Yeah, mean I think there is. To a certain degree,
they're kind of two sides to thesame coin, but there are some
differences. So when you'rebuilding a good habit, when
you're trying to build a newhabit, it's not Well first let's
just set the stage. So what isthe definition of a habit? So a
habit is a behavior that hasbeen repeated enough times to be
(13:16):
more or less automatic.
So you can do it pretty much onautopilot. So like brushing your
teeth, tying your shoes,unplugging the toaster after
each use. And then, you know,it's not just physical things,
it also can be habits of thoughtor things that you say. So, you
know, maybe you don't realizethat you apologize each time
before you ask a question. Oh,I'm sorry, but, you know,
whatever.
Or that you cover your mouthevery time before you laugh, or
(13:40):
that you have a certain, like,mental loop that you get into or
anxiety habit that you get intowhen a certain things happens or
whatever. So there are all kindsof habits like that. But the
point is that you have repeatedthem enough times that you kind
of slide into them naturally bydefault on autopilot without
thinking about it. Now when itcomes to building a good habit,
(14:01):
well, the behavior is notautomatic yet. It hasn't been
built yet.
So one of the key factors inbuilding a good habit is
repeating it enough times togain, like, fluency and fluidity
and, you know, gain, the abilityto make it routine because it's
not that yet. But then when youthink about breaking a bad
habit, well, many of our badhabits are, by definition,
(14:24):
they're already habits. Right?They've been established.
They're already automatic.
You bite your fingers withoutthinking about it, or you tore
your hair even though you don'tnotice, or you, you know, fall
into this, anxiety trap withoutbefore you even realize that
you're And so bad habits are arekind of like already
nonconscious and automatic. Andso one of the challenges with
(14:45):
those is becoming aware of themat first. So bad habits kind of
require a lot of self awarenessin the beginning because you
don't even realize that you'redoing it. And then if we can
combine these two, so you've gotyou've got the good habit,
you're really trying to focuson, like, get the reps in, make
it routine, make it automatic,and then you've got the bad
habit, it's already automatic.How do I make it maybe more
(15:06):
conscious or realize or becomeself aware of it?
They can you know, there areother strategies for breaking
bad habits, like you can justeliminate it outright or you can
try to curtail it by reducingsome of the triggers that prompt
it, things like that. But youcan also and we can talk about
more of that stuff if you'dlike. But, but when it comes to
(15:29):
building, good habits, sometimesI think the most effective way
to break a bad habit is just tofocus on building a good one.
You don't even really worryabout the bad habit. So like
let's say for example, that youhave, that you have a bad habit
of watching like too much TVwhen you get home from work or
playing video games orsomething.
You get home and you turn on thescreen and then you just zone
out for a few hours. Well, youcould focus on a bunch of ways
(15:51):
to try to break that habit, youknow, you like hide the video
game controller, figure outstrategies for how to break
stuff like that. But you couldalso say, well, there is a good
habit I wanna build, which is Iwanna get in shape. I wanna
start exercising more. And sorather than even think you don't
even think about the screenthing, video games or TV.
And you just say, alright, I'mgonna focus on the new habit of
(16:14):
when I get home from work, Ichange into my workout clothes.
And then after I change into myworkout clothes, I head to the
gym. Well, if you can start tomaster that habit, make exercise
easier, get into the, the flowof doing that. Well, when you're
at the gym, you've kind of havealready taken care of like an
hour of that video game habit.You know, you can't play it
because you're at the gym doingsets and reps.
(16:36):
Right? Like you're not evenyou're not even thinking about
the TV because you're somewhereelse doing something else.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
And basically, the lesson here is that everybody
only has twenty four hours in aday. And so a lot of the time,
kinda like one plant crowdingout another and taking up the
sunlight and nutrients in thesoil, good habits can crowd out
your bad ones automatically. Andso sometimes I think it's more
useful just to focus on thepositive side of the equation
(17:01):
and build some good ones andthen your bad ones fall by the
wayside naturally. It doesn'talways work, but sometimes that
can be helpful.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Now everyone also gets off track when they want to
start a new habit such asrunning in this case. What do
you do when you get off course?What are the approaches you
would recommend people take whenthey miss a day or two of
running, they're sick or theyjust feel lazy that day or
(17:28):
they've been busy and their kidshave lots of stuff going on,
they can't run. What do yourecommend when people get off
course?
Speaker 2 (17:34):
You know, if you think about it from like a
overall perspective or a highlevel, there really are only two
things that you have to do tothink about your habits. You
need to master the art ofgetting started, so you have to
figure out how to make it easyto get started and then you have
to figure out how to stick. Sogetting started on a habit and
sticking to a habit, those arereally the only two things, from
a big big overall view thatmatter. And then if you think
(17:58):
about it even further, you zoomout like one level higher than
that, really sticking to a habitjust means that you get started
on it each day. So really theonly problem to solve is getting
started.
If you can make it easy to getstarted each day, you'll
automatically stick to it. Andif it's easy to get started,
then and you're sticking to it,then you don't have anything
else to worry about becauseyou're doing it all the time.
(18:19):
So, so I think a lot of thiscomes back to making it easy to
start, reminding yourself tostart, getting over the friction
of starting day in and day out.So, you know, I guess we could
just summarize it as saying, ahabit simply means a behavior
that you get started on each dayMhmm. Or consistently.
So if that's true and then youfind that you have fallen off
(18:42):
course, as you just said in yourquestion, then the only thing to
focus on when you fall off trackis making it easy to start
again. And, there are a coupledifferent things you can do. You
know, we already mentioned thetwo minute rule, so scale it
down. If you've, let's say, forexample, in the case of running,
let's say you've been runningfor, like, two months and you've
been consistent, you've beendoing it three days a week or
(19:04):
something, and, and then yourkids get sick or you have to
travel for work for a week orwhatever it is, something takes
you off track and you didn't getany running in that week. So now
you've you have this backslideand sometimes people feel like,
oh, I need to get right back towhere I was before or they
realize, oh man, I'm already Ialready lost some progress, you
(19:25):
know, like, not gonna be able tofinish the full workouts this
week that I was supposed to dolast week.
And that can make them feellike, oh, I've already blown it.
And, instead, I would say, don'tworry about coming right back in
at the level you were at. Youcan just if you have trouble
getting started again, scaleback down to that two minute
version. You know, just put onyour running shoes and get out
(19:46):
the door, or do the workout thatyou were doing the first week
rather than, you know, threedays ago. So, focusing on
scaling it down can help a lot.
But the real mantra that I thatI like to keep in mind and the
philosophy that sort of helps meget back on track and get
started after I slide off courseis never miss twice. So, you
(20:07):
know, this is particularlypowerful, I think, for like
diets and there are certain typeof habits that people get very
all or nothing about forwhatever reason, know, like
diets are, it's like, all right,picked this diet plan and I'm
gonna stick to it and they do itfor five days and then on the
sixth day, their friends wannago to happy hour or they binge
eat a pizza or something. Andthey're like, oh, you know, I
(20:29):
knew I was gonna blow it, Iguess I'm not cut out for this
diet, which is so interesting,right? That like you do
something five out of six days,but you think like, oh, I'm not
cut out for it. Yeah.
For whatever reason, we we justget very like, it's either a %
or it's zero.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (20:43):
And and, so never miss twice is a mantra that
kinda helps overcome that whereyou say, alright. I wish I
hadn't binge ate the pizza, butnever missed twice. So let me
make sure the next meal is ahealthy one. Or in my case, for
a long time, you know, I waswriting articles for the first
few years. When I startedJamesClear.com, I was writing
(21:05):
every Monday and Thursday.
Well, if I missed on Thursday, Iwish that hadn't happened, but
never missed twice. So let memake sure that I show up and get
something out on Monday. And, ithelps you get over that
perfectionism trap, that all ornothing trap, and ultimately it
just nudges you to do that onething that matters which is how
(21:26):
can I make sure I get startednext time and so I think that
that's can be one helpful way todeal with that?
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Yeah, the never miss twice is great. Yeah and that's
sort of what I reinforce with myrunners than under run
participants is just like it'sokay to miss a workout and you
know, just come back and if youneed to scale back, do it and
just you know get back on thehorse and you haven't ruined or
(21:52):
lost all your fitness and justbecause you missed one or two
workouts by any means. I lovethat, never miss twice. Okay,
let's move into the nextsection. So I just want to walk
through sort of a typical nonrun participant and, I thought
it might be cool to sort ofprofile, give them a sort of an
(22:12):
avatar and then we could, youcould walk through some some
quick tips for this person basedon your sort of your four laws
of behavior change and thosebeing one make it obvious, two
make it attractive, three makeit easy, and four make it
satisfying.
So a typical participant comingin an under run program, they
(22:34):
might be overweight, may or maynot be overweight, they want to
improve their diet, they'rebusy, they've got you know one,
two, three kids, they work afull time job, motivation and
time is lacking at times butthey really want to start
running. So there's lots goingon, there's lots of change
required but perhaps we can walkthrough based on the four laws
(22:58):
of behavior change sort of whatthis person can do to set
themselves up for success.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
Yeah, so first of all, me set the context a little
bit. So you know, in the book Italk about kind of dividing a
habit into four stages, cue,craving, response, reward. I
won't explain it all in detailright here. If you wanna get the
full explanation, can check out,chapter three of the book. But
the point is that dividing ahabit into these four stages
(23:27):
allows us to understand betterhow a habit works and what we
can do to change it.
And so each of these four laws,each one addresses one of those
four steps. So, in the case of,like, for example, make it
obvious, the idea is to make thecues that trigger and prompt
your good habits as obvious andavailable and visible as
(23:47):
possible. And then for each ofthe four laws, you can invert it
if you wanna break a bad habit.So you make the cues invisible
instead of making it obvious foryour bad habits. So it's how can
we hide those cues, reducedistractions, reduce exposure,
and so and, and so on.
So, in the case of, like, thisprototypical runner who would
(24:09):
come into the known to runprogram, I think the one of the
first things to to do, we canfocus on the third law of
behavior change, making it easy.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
So in order to make running easy, especially if
you're busy, you got a couplekids or things are just crazy at
work, you have this very packedschedule. So the first element
of this is simplicity. I findthat a lot of time, you know,
behaviors are sort of tied toeach other in the sense that you
change one thing and thatreminds you of something else
(24:41):
you'd like to change too. Right?So may you might have people
come in and say, oh, alright, Iwanna start running and I'm also
gonna stretch consistently andI'm gonna change my diet and,
start meditating or whatever,right?
They they like wanna do all ofthese health habits as a
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Complete life overhaul.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
And, and I and I think that's natural. As soon as
you start to get motivated aboutone change, you start thinking
about all the other stuff youwanna do. And you know, it's
kinda kinda comes in and you, asyou said, you try to do this
complete overhaul thing. So whatI think people often don't
realize is that when you try tochange one thing, you often need
(25:20):
to change multiple. So let'ssay, for example, that you're
gonna build the habit of eatinghealthy.
Well, you might say, alright,I'm just gonna focus on this one
habit. I'm gonna eat healthy.But actually, you need to change
like five other related habitsfor that to happen. Right? You
need to change your mealplanning and prep habits.
You need to change your groceryshopping habits so you're buying
(25:43):
better food. You may need tochange your cooking habits and,
like, chopping and preparationof the food. After you get done
eating the meal, you need tochange your cleaning habits and
you know, because you're cookingmore meals at home rather than
eating out or whatever. Inreality, like the actual habit
you're trying to do, eating ahealthy meal, that's like eating
the meals, easy part. It's likeall this other stuff that's
related to it.
(26:03):
Mhmm. And I think we couldprobably say that many people
who are trying to build thishabit of running are facing a
similar situation where, theactual run itself is maybe the
easy part, especially if youscale it down and start small.
It's all the other stuff relatedto it, finding the time and
space to do it, making sure thatI take care of my
(26:25):
responsibilities with my family,before I'm, you know, trying to
go out on this run or whatever.Figuring out what kind of
program I'm gonna be following.I don't even know what I you
know, and now I need to changemy habits of, researching
workout programs and things.
So there's a lot of extralogistical stuff that goes along
with doing just one habit. So mymy key point with that is
(26:48):
simplicity. Focusing on just onething, let the meditation and
the stretching and the dietchanges and all that stuff, let
it sit to the side for now.Let's just think about running.
Then the second piece of makingthat easy is scaling it down so
that it's not intimidating.
So that you feel like, you know,if I was gonna ask myself, you
got this busy schedule, I'mgonna ask myself to go for a
(27:10):
forty five minute run three daysa week, they're gonna be when
I'm motivated, when I have thetime and the space, I'll make it
happen. But as soon as the daygets busy, then I start looking
at my calendar and my clock andI think, ugh, I don't have forty
five minutes, right? I got tenminutes. Mhmm. So, I think the
level that you want to scaledown to, the question to ask
yourself if your habit is easyenough or not, is can I do this
(27:34):
98% of the time no matter whatthe conditions without fail?
And if you can't do it thatfrequently, that consistently,
then it's too big. At least inthe beginning, right, at least
at the very start. All we'reagain, in the beginning, all
we're trying to do is master theart of showing up. Become the
type of person that gets yourrunning shoes on and gets out
the door, even if it only meansthat it's at 10:00 after you put
(27:57):
your kids to bed and all you dois run around the block and then
come back inside. But you haveto like find a way to become
that person that's showing upconsistently first.
So make it easy is a big part ofthat. I guess I'll pause there
and then we can dive into theother three. I just want to see
if you got other stuff to add orwant me to expand on any
particular part.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
No, I think that's good. Yeah, just just carry on
your train of thought there,this is great.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
So so making it easy and staying simple and focused,
I think is a good place tostart. Then we can kind of go
through these other threestages, right? So the first law
of behavior change is to make itobvious. Well, you can ask
yourself, what are the thingsthat I need, that make running
obvious to me? What are the cuesthat prompt that habit?
(28:41):
So maybe it's seeing your waterbottle filled. Maybe it's seeing
your running shoes sitting bythe door. Maybe it's, the route
that you're gonna run mapped outon your phone, and you can like
check that throughout the dayand remind yourself where you're
gonna be running or whatever.But no matter what it is, there
are gonna be some cues that kindof prompt and remind and
motivate you to get started onthat habit. And I think the the
(29:04):
key thing to think about here isyou wanna prime the environment
so that all that stuff is readyand visible and available for
you.
So I actually have a couplereaders who, you know, a lot of
people I think will prep theirgym bag the night before or set
their running shoes out by thedoor so that they can see them
right away when they get up, ifthey're trying to go for a run
(29:25):
or workout in the morning. Iactually have some readers who
will wear their running clothesto bed. Wow. All they have to do
is roll out of bed, put theirfeet in their shoes and then
step out the
Speaker 1 (29:35):
door. I love that.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
And, so that's those are examples of not only making
it obvious, but making it again,that third law, making it easy,
right? Making it as easy aspossible, as convenient as
possible to slide into thishabit. So that's an example of
how to apply the first law ofbehavior change. I I also wanna
add while I'm talking aboutthis, it can be helpful to think
(29:58):
about the inverse of each lawand how it might be preventing
you from moving forward. So whenit comes to the cues of your
good habits of running, likeseeing your shoes or your water
bottle and so on, those helpnudge you forward.
But it also might be worth thingworth asking, what are the cues
that distract me? What are thethings that pull me off course?
(30:19):
And can I make those cues lessobvious, less available, less
visible? You know, you may find,for example, that, you wake up
in the morning and you turn offyour alarm on your phone, and
the first thing you do is youtap the email icon, and then you
start scrolling through youremail. And you may find that
that cue of seeing the emailicon and scrolling through that,
(30:41):
the habit of scrolling throughyour phone, that if you start to
see emails from your boss andwork related stuff or whatever,
that either you start to getanxious or overthink, you know,
start thinking about what youneed to do for the day, or you
may just find that that pullsyou into work immediately.
Know, you go take a shower andyou just immediately start doing
all the stuff you need to do andit like swallows up that forty
(31:01):
five minutes that you would havehad Mhmm. To go for a run. And
so perhaps you should askyourself, well, can I cut that
cue out? You know, like maybemaybe it's more useful to charge
your phone in the kitchen thanin your bedroom and buy an
actual alarm clock and put itright next to your bed.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
And now when you wake up, you turn the alarm off, but
you don't tap on the email icon.You're not reading emails before
you've even taken a step. And,and maybe you, you know, turn
off the alarm, get out of bed,go for a run for a half hour,
come back, take a shower, andstart your day, and then you
check the email. But my point isthat it's not only useful to
make the cues of your goodhabits obvious, it's also can be
(31:40):
very helpful to make thedistractions, invisible. So,
restructuring your environmentin that way can be useful as
well.
Alright. So that's the firstlaw. We talked about making it
obvious. We talked about thethird law, making it easy. The
other two, make it attractiveand make it satisfying.
So making your habits moreattractive, making them more
(32:02):
appealing is really about themeaning that you assign to the
behavior. So, let me, let megive you an example. Okay. Let's
say that you go to bed and youthink, alright, tomorrow's gonna
be the day, right? I'm gonnawake up at six, I'm gonna go for
a run early, and I'm gonna go towork.
(32:23):
You go to sleep, 6AM rollsaround, and your bed is warm,
it's cold outside, and you'relike, well, maybe I'll just hit
snooze instead. But if yourewind the clock and, you send a
text to a friend the day before,and you say, hey. Can we meet at
the park at 06:30 and go for arun? Well, now 6AM rolls around
(32:44):
and your bed is still warm andstill cold outside, but if you
don't get out and go to thepark, you're a jerk because you
leave your friend there allalone. Right?
So that's what, psychologistscall this a commitment device.
It's like a choice that you makenow that helps lock in your
behavior for the future. Andthat's one way to make habits
more attractive, right? Suddenlyit's more appealing to wake up
(33:07):
at 6AM than it was previously.Because now if you don't get up,
there's like a cost associatedwith that behavior.
And so making your habitsattractive is kind of like about
re it's about shifting thatanalysis in your head. Like, oh,
what does 6AM mean? How howattractive is it now? And, and
(33:29):
little strategies like that canhelp nudge you along, you know,
and, and help lock in yourfuture behavior and make it more
likely that you fall through.So, commitment devices are a
helpful way to make habits moreattractive.
And then finally, we have thefourth law of behavior change,
make it satisfying. So reallywhat this is all about, and this
(33:49):
is what helps get a habit tostick in the long run, is you
want to feel successful once youfinish the habit. The completion
of the habit should besatisfying, enjoyable,
pleasurable. The more that youhave positive emotions and
feelings associated with thefinish of the habit, the more
you're training your brain andteaching yourself, hey, this
(34:11):
felt good. I should do thisagain next time.
You know, like if you feel badafter you finish habit, well,
nobody wants to repeat that.Right? So, there are a couple
things you can do here. And Ithink that you can think about
it both on a short term orimmediate gratification
timescale and a long term orultimate outcome timescale. So
(34:31):
the ultimate outcome of goingfor a run consistently is great.
You get in shape. You startstart to feel good about
yourself, you lose a little bitof weight, you start to identify
as I'm a runner. But most ofthose rewards that I just
described, they don't come for awhile. Right? They don't come
until three or six or twelvemonths later.
Like, you need to stick with itfor a while. Mhmm. And so
(34:54):
there's this valley of deathfrom the beginning of a habit
until that ultimate outcome,those ultimate rewards start to
accumulate and show up. And inthat valley, in that gap there
from when you start to when youstart to identify as a runner
and get those long term rewards,it can be helpful to have some
external motivators, someexternal rewards that get you
(35:15):
through that period. So, youknow, for example, you could
say, at the end of each weekwhen I do all of my running,
let's say you're running threedays a week.
For every week that I get mythree days in, on Saturday, I
get to take a bubble bath. Andso the reason I like that is
because it you could alsoimagine other external rewards
(35:37):
like, people do this withexercise a lot. After I do my
workout, I reward myself with amilkshake or a, you know, a bowl
of ice cream or something. Well,the the external reward is
there, but I don't like thatstrategy because you're casting
conflicting votes. Right?
Like on the one hand, you'revoting for I am a healthy
person, I worked out.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
On the other hand, you're voting for I eat ice
cream. And so what you'relooking for is an external
reward that aligns with orreinforces your desired
identity. And so that's why Ilike, for example, the bubble
bath, option, because bothtaking a bubble bath and going
for a run are casting a vote forI'm taking care of my body. And
(36:20):
it doesn't always have to alignperfectly like that, but at a
minimum, don't want the externalreward to conflict with who
you're trying to be become. Sothat kind of gives you a
overview of how to apply, makeit obvious, make it attractive,
make it easy, make it satisfyingand use those four laws of
behavior change to improve theodds or increase the odds that
(36:43):
you'll fall through on the run.
Speaker 1 (36:45):
I love that. Thanks for walking through that for us.
Okay, the last part of theconversation here, I've got a
couple, two looks like threequestions. Some of the
questions, some of theinformation you may have touched
upon but we'll go through themanyway here. The first question
is from Nicole Park and shesays, What tips do you have
(37:05):
about adding on to habits?
If I set my habit goalsrealistically enough, I can
usually stick to the first verysmall habit but as soon as I add
another or up the ante, I can'tseem to stick to either habit.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Yeah that's a good question. Okay so there are two
possible strategies that I cantake here. So first strategy is
if and this sounds like whatshe's trying to do, if you want
to perform multiple habits. AndI think the answer here is to
try to find the right time andlocation to insert each habit
(37:40):
into your life, and then keepthem small enough that you can
make a little stack out of them.So, this is a strategy that in
the book I refer to as habitstacking.
I first learned about it from BJFogg. He's this professor at
Stanford. And the basic idea isthat you stack or add one habit
on top of another. So let's saythat you're, you can create,
(38:05):
like, a morning productivitystack, for example. And let's
say that you always make a cupof coffee every morning.
Well, you could say, after Imake my morning cup of coffee, I
will meditate for sixty seconds.And then you're like, alright, I
did that for a few weeks, andthat's easy, which is what she's
mentioning in this question.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
And now I think, okay. Not only do I wanna
meditate, I also want to startjournaling. Well, the key here
is to make sure that themorning, first of all, is the
right time of day to do this foryou. You know, you can imagine,
for example, if you have littlekids, like your four year old
doesn't care at all if you'retrying to meditate. They're just
running around and, you know,you're trying to get people
(38:43):
ready for school and whatever.
So maybe the morning is not theright time for that habit. But
let's assume that it is. Youneed to keep it small enough
that you can build this littlestack. So you could say, after I
make my morning cup of coffee, Iwill meditate for sixty seconds.
After I meditate for sixtyseconds, I will journal one
sentence about what happenedyesterday.
After I journal one sentence, Iwill write my to do list for the
(39:04):
day and start working on thefirst task. And, so now you have
this little morning productivitystack, right, where you've got,
like, three little things. Imeditate, I journal, and I do my
to do list. And they all canhappen in rapid succession
building on each other, andthey're short enough that you
can actually stick to them. Soso the scale and the scope is
important there, and so is thetiming and asking yourself to do
(39:27):
it at the right time of day.
So that's the first strategy.The second strategy, though, is
to say, alright. I'm not gonnaadd multiple things to my life.
So I'm not going to bothmeditate and journal and do the
to do list. I'm just gonna pickone habit to focus on.
So let's say, for example, that,that writing is the important
(39:49):
habit that you're gonna you'regonna focus around. Well, the
same thing happens as what she'smentioning here. You start
writing and you say, alright.I'm gonna write one sentence
each day. And you do that for, Idon't know, a month or two, and
then all of a sudden it getsboring.
You're like, alright, I I'mwriting a sentence every day,
but, you know, it's I'm used toit. I know what to expect,
whatever. Well, the thing to dothen is not to add another
(40:13):
habit, a separate unrelatedhabit. It's to find a new detail
to get obsessed with orinterested in. And so you're
still asking yourself to do thecore fundamental, but, but
you're finding a new way to befascinated with the behavior.
So let's take, say you're like,alright, you know, I've been
writing a hundred words a day,and, now I start to know to know
(40:35):
what to expect. So for the nextfew weeks, my little 1%
improvement, the area I'm gonnafocus on improving is I'm gonna
try to write great openingsentences. And so maybe I'll
pick a few books off the shelf,and I'll look at how they the
opening sentence for eachchapter. Maybe I'll go to the
New York Times and see what thepopular articles are in that
site, and, like, look at whatthe opening sentences are there.
(40:56):
And that kinda becomes myresearch for trying to improve
my own opening sentences.
And after you do that and addthat into your habit for, you
know, the next few weeks, thenyou pick a different thing to
focus on. Maybe now you'refocused on transitions between
paragraphs or on a greatconcluding sentence or things
like that. And, my point here,whether it's writing or running
(41:18):
is another good thing you like.Maybe one, for a few weeks,
focus on hand placement whileyou're running or on foot strike
or on your stride length or, youknow, breathing, a ton of other
right there, like an infiniterange of things you could think
about. Mhmm.
But you are sticking to the samefundamentals, but you're finding
a new detail to be interestedin. And I think the advantage of
(41:39):
that is that it prevents youfrom jumping from habit to
habit. You know, there are somany people who do things like,
alright. I write for six weeks,then I got bored. Well, maybe I
shouldn't write.
Maybe I should start a podcast.And then I do a podcast for six
weeks, then I didn't get bored.Well, maybe I should do a
YouTube channel or whatever. Butthey're never sticking with
anything long enough to gettheir results. And so, finding
(42:00):
new details to be fascinatedwith is a good way of overcoming
that barrier and, continuing toexpand your habit and scope, but
maintaining the interest in thatcore fundamental that really
matters.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
That's great. Nicole also asked, any tips on how to
get back up from a perceivedfailure? Well I think you, you
tackled that a little bitearlier in the conversation so
we'll we'll move on to the nextone here. And this question is
from Kate Reid. She says, James,my best chance to run is in the
morning as I don't govern whenmy workdays end but I'm not a
(42:36):
morning person by any stretch ofimagination.
Takes me a good forty fiveminutes to wake up to any kind
of functional level. How can Imake this work?
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Yeah, that's a good question. So it's tough but I
would say that the commitmentdevice idea that I shared
earlier, so whether that'stexting a friend to run with
them or joining a running clubor, otherwise meeting somebody,
tends to be enough of a socialmotivator to get you out of bed
(43:05):
if you don't feel like that'swhat you naturally would do.
Right? If left to your owndevices and you don't feel like
a morning person, you might justhit snooze and, you know, like,
not make it happen. But thesocial cost is enough to to make
it work.
And that was her question, like,how can I make it work? Well,
that's one way. So increasingthe consequence that you feel.
If you're not in a position or aplace, or don't, you know, don't
(43:27):
have a group like that that youcould join or people that you
could meet, you can also try, aninteresting, technological
solution. So I, I came across astory of this one guy who he
wanted to to start waking upearlier.
He wanted to wake up at 6AM eachday, but he just was the same
(43:49):
thing. He wasn't a morningperson. It was a struggle. So he
set up a an automated schedule,an automatic tweet to go out at
06:05. And that tweet would say,I'm not awake yet because I'm
lazy.
The first five people to replyto this, I will pay PAYU $20.
And and so that went out at06:05. So he would wake up at
(44:12):
six, and the first thing hewould do is turn off his alarm
clock and then reschedule thetweet for the next day. And so
as long as he was waking up oron time, he was always able to
move the tweet back a day. And,and that was enough, of course,
to get him up and out of bed.
And then once he was out of bed,the rest kinda fell in line. So,
it's possible that you could dosomething like that. Like, maybe
(44:33):
you could schedule the tweet,charge your phone in the
kitchen. And so by the time youwake up and get down to the
kitchen and schedule the tweetfor the next day, now it's like
alright, I've already put inenough work, let me just grab a
cup of coffee and then go for arun. Little things like that
might be enough to get youmoving to make it happen.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
I like that and I definitely like the social cost.
In the summer here in Toronto,I'm part of a cycling club
actually and we meet at one ofthe sort of big parks at 05:20
or 05:30 in the morning and I'vegot two buddies I ride with and
I know they're waiting for me atthe top of my street at 05:30
sharp, I got to be there. So thesocial cost is it definitely
(45:18):
works for me and yeah, it's agood strategy.
Speaker 2 (45:22):
It's actually remarkable how meaningful of a
driver the social environment isfor our habits. I think you
know, I I have a whole chapteron this in atomic habits, and I
think even still, I undersoldthe importance of it. So many of
the behaviors that we performare a response to the groups
that we belong to. And, so beingpart of that cycling group, it
(45:45):
changes your morning routine.Right?
It changes whether you wake up.And the same thing is true for
all kinds of of habits that wedo each day. Know? Like, if you
if you move into this is true inbig and small ways. I mean, if
you move into a new neighborhoodand you walk outside and you see
all your neighbors have theirrecycling bins out on Wednesday
night, well, you're like, oh, Iguess we need to sign up for
(46:06):
recycling.
That's what everybody like usdoes here, you know? And those
little social nudges andreinforcements are all around us
and, if you can get in with theright group or the right tribe,
then you can start to put thatpeer pressure to work for you
rather than against you. It canbe a very, beneficial and
positive force when when you'resurrounded by the right folks.
Speaker 1 (46:29):
Yeah, I agree, very powerful. So we should wrap up
just to be conscious of our timehere and your time. Is there any
tools or habit trackers yourecommend? Know there's a sort
of a supplementary paper basedhabit tracking like is it a
journal that you have that sortof accompanies your book or is
(46:49):
there anything else that yourecommend and yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Yeah, so I wrote Atomic Habits that's kind of the
comprehensive guide on howhabits work and how to change
them, you know, gives you a lotof the, strategies we talked
about today, and you know, abunch of other ones that we
didn't have time to get into.And then as a compliment to
that, we created what I call thehabit journal, and, it's got a
section in the front that has alot helps you build a journaling
(47:15):
habit and kinda write one lineper day. So there's 12 pages
there, so one for each month.And then the bulk of the
notebook is just a regularnotebook. You can use it to help
you use any other notebook.
It's a dot grid. You know, youcan fill I I use it to record my
workouts in, but you could useit for whatever you want. And
then at the back of thenotebook, there are 12 habit
tracker templates. So again, onefor each month of the year, and,
(47:37):
you can write down the habitthat you're performing and then
each day, there's 31 cells youcan, you know, check off or
shade in each day, of the monththere and then tally your total
at the end and so on. You know,I have to say, it's funny
because I I've been writingabout this stuff for a long time
and the journal just came out afew months ago, but I've really
enjoyed using it.
It's been a little bit of asurprise to me. I have never had
(47:59):
a consistent journaling habit,and this was the first time that
I, you know, the first monththat I used it, I journaled 30
out of 30 one days. So it'skinda nice to see the principles
in practice and see that they,you know, they do work. And the
so the habit journal is a nicecomplement to Atomic Habits and,
a good manual way to put some ofthose ideas into practice. But
then, you know, there are also avariety of apps and stuff for
(48:23):
your phone.
I I don't have any particularone that I tend to recommend.
Mhmm. I actually I actuallythink that a lot of the habit
apps don't work that well, but,we'll see. I have a lot of
people asking if I'll design oneat some point. I don't know.
Maybe we will, but I don't haveany immediate plans to to do it,
but we'll see what happens. Butfor now, the Atomic Habits and
(48:44):
the Habit Journal are kind of myone two punch.
Speaker 1 (48:46):
That's great. So where can listeners find out
more about your book and theHabit Journal and then the other
work, your writings that you do?
Speaker 2 (48:56):
Well, you can find all my stuff at jamesclear.com
and, if you click on articles,you can just kind of poke around
there and see what interestsyou. If you feel like signing up
to the newsletter, you can dothat as well. And if you click
on books, then you'll see bothAtomic Habits and the Habit
Journal and if you want to justgo straight to the book and find
the best place to grab a copy,you can just go to
(49:17):
AtomicHabits.com.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
Awesome. Well James, thanks so much for joining us
today and hopefully the nexttime we speak is in another six
years from now.
Speaker 2 (49:28):
Yeah, I hope so. Thank you so much, I appreciate
it.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
Thanks James.
James, thanks a lot for coming back. I wouldn't say
(00:02):
come back on the show but it'sit's well, it's been about six
years. I just looked back on theprevious my blog feed and I
think it was 03/10/2013. Soanyways, welcome back and great
to chat again.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Yeah. Thank you. Good to talk to you as well and kudos
on the consistency and beingaround six years later. That's
great.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
I'm still around and obviously so are you. So first,
I just wanna congratulate you onyour your book that came out.
When did it actually come out?Was it October or?
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yep, October 2018. So it's been out for a few months
now as of us recording this.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yeah, so the book is called Atomic Habits, an easy
and proven way to build goodhabits and break Bad Ones and
I've read through it, loved it,recommended it to quite a few
people already and actuallywe're up skiing with my family
this past weekend and that thefamily we stay with, I walk in
the kitchen, first thing Inotice is a coffee on the
(00:58):
kitchen table.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Oh wow, that's good.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
So I was like, I'm actually talking to James on
Wednesday. So anyways, that wasthat was kind of cool.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
So
Speaker 1 (01:07):
anyways, I just want basically break our conversation
into three parts, three mainparts I'm thinking. First part
sort of being walk through somesort of the general principles
of the book, second part beingmaybe take you through a
scenario like what a typicalnone to run subscribers, sort of
their typical scenario andperhaps we can walk through and
(01:30):
maybe give some tips for aperson sort of in that
circumstance and with thosegoals. And then the last part, I
just got two or three questionsfrom some of my subscribers. So
I'd love to get to those if wecan and that's about it.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Yeah, great. That sounds perfect.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Awesome. So the first part, so some of the general
principles that I like and wouldlove to get you to give us sort
of a general tips and feedbackand guidance around those
principles would be awesome. Thefirst one being and this is a
(02:08):
overcoming the lack ofmotivation and willpower as it
comes to you know building a newhabit. Obviously you know
overcoming that inertia isdifficult for many. Want to do
it but it's hard, so what's sortof your general advice, thoughts
and tips around overcoming sortof a lack of motivation and
willpower?
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Yeah, it's a good question. So I think first of
all, maybe to invert thequestion, don't really think
it's a good idea to rely onmotivation and willpower. And so
some of kind of my centralphilosophy and approach sort of
comes out of that, or maybe islike the other side of that
coin. So if if you don't havemuch motivation or willpower,
(02:47):
what can you manage to do? Well,you can usually only manage to
do small things.
And so if you think of, youknow, you sort of think of any
habit as maybe like a spectrumfrom very easy to very hard, you
know, so, like, doing one pushup is very easy. Doing a hundred
push ups might be very hard. Orin the case of running, you
know, putting on your runningshoes is very easy. Walking for
(03:10):
ten minutes is easy. Going for arun for a five k might be,
moderate or maybe a 10 k orsomething is hard, and a
marathon might be very hard.
Right? Yeah. So, a lot ofpeople, when they start, they
they say things like what youjust said, like, oh, I I really
want to do it. I want to run themarathon. I wanna be able to do
(03:30):
a hundred push ups, but there Ithink we don't even realize that
we're jumping so far down thespectrum.
Right? We're just, like,immediately thinking of this
ultimate finish line or outcomethat we want. And, instead, you
know, and this is one of thecore ideas of atomic habits, I
think it's much more useful tofocus on the easy portion of the
spectrum, to scale it down andfocus on the simplest action,
(03:52):
the first movement. So the kindof the practical answer to your
question, what do you do whenyou don't have much willpower?
What do you do when you feellike you're low on motivation?
I talk about a variety ofstrategies in the book, but I
think one good place to start iswith what I call the two minute
rule. So you basically takewhatever habit you're trying to
build, and you scale it down tosomething that you can do in two
(04:14):
minutes or less. So in the caseof, you know, running three
miles or something, that becomesput on your running shoes, or do
yoga four days a week becomestake out your yoga mat. Or read
30 books a year becomes read onepage. Something that takes two
minutes or less to do.
And you're you're really tryingto automate that first action,
(04:35):
that first movement. And I havea a story or an example that I
like to share from a reader ofmine. So he he ended up losing
over a hundred pounds, but oneof the first things that he did
was he went to the gym and hewasn't allowed to stay for
longer than five minutes. So hewould get in the car, drive to
the gym, get out, do half anexercise, get back in the car,
(04:56):
drive home. And it sounds sillyto people at first.
It sounds like, you know, sosmall as to almost be
ridiculous. You know? It's like,well, clearly, doing half an
exercise or being in the gym forfive minutes is not gonna be the
thing that gets you in shape.But what the key thing that he
was doing and what you realizeis he was mastering the art of
showing up. Right?
He was becoming the type ofperson that went to the gym four
(05:19):
days a week Mhmm. Even if it wasonly for a few minutes. And if
you don't become that kind ofperson, then you don't really
have a chance to be the personwho works out for forty five
minutes for four days a week.Right? Like, you you, I think
this is, you know, maybe asurprising and deeper truth
about how habits work and whatyou need to focus on, which is
(05:39):
that a habit must be establishedbefore it can be improved.
Right? Figure out a way to makeit the normal in your life, the
standard, before you worry aboutoptimizing it. And if you can
become that person who puts ontheir running shoes three days a
week or who goes to the gym forfive minutes, four days a week,
then you have a chance to be theperson who does the big
ambitious thing that's on thehard side of the spectrum. And,
(06:02):
so I think that's really mysolution for dealing with
willpower and discipline andmotivation problems is let's
scale it down to a point whereit's so easy, you feel like you
could do it 98% of the time evenif you had no motivation. And
then once that becomes yournormal, then we can start
talking about ways to upgradeand expand from there.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
I love that and that's so common. Mean, fall
into that trap, think everyonedoes. You start something new
and whether it's you knowrunning, cycling, playing the
piano, whatever and you'relooking for that improvement,
improvement, improvement whenyou haven't established even you
know the habit of you knowplaying the piano four or five
(06:39):
times a week. So yeah, that's socommon and I love that advice
that you just gave there. That'sin the book as well I believe,
right?
That story
Speaker 2 (06:47):
about Yeah, the two minute rule is maybe 75% of the
way through. It's mentioned inthere as part of making your
habits easy and convenient.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah and I think the story about the fellow driving
to the gym is in the book aswell if I remember.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Yeah, you know ultimately, what we're talking
about here is you want toperform a habit enough times
that you feel like it'sreinforcing being a certain type
of person, Right? So in the caseof you know, I mentioned this in
chapter two of the book, thiskind of concept of identity
based habits, that that truebehavior change at a certain
level is really identity change.It's really about looking at
(07:21):
yourself in a new way. You know,there there are a lot of people
who, when they start working outor they start going for runs or
whatever, it feels it feels likea lot. It feels like a
sacrifice.
It feels like it's not normal.It feels like it requires a lot
of energy and effort to do that.But there are also plenty of
other people who going to thegym three days a week is normal.
It's just it's it doesn't feellike a sacrifice. It's just
(07:42):
kinda what they do.
Mhmm. And I think that thatshift occurs once you start to
adopt that action as part ofyour identity. And so this is
why I I say things like, thegoal is not to run a marathon.
The goal is to become a runner.The goal is not to meditate for
twenty minutes every day.
The goal is to be a meditator.The goal is not to write a book,
(08:03):
it's to be a writer. Becauseonce you identify as those
things, I am a writer, I am ameditator, I am a runner. Well,
then it's like doing thoseactions does not require a lot
of additional effort ormotivation because you're just
acting in alignment with who youalready believe yourself to be.
Know, like, do I need to getmotivated to write?
(08:24):
Well, not really because that'swho I am. Right? I am a writer.
That's what writers do. And Ithink the so the natural
question follows from that, ofcourse, is like, well, if that's
true, then how do I get to thatpoint?
Right? How do I become that? Andthis is where I think we get,
you know, the loop closes and weget back to this kind of two
minute idea, which is you showup in small ways. You know? You
(08:45):
write a sentence each day.
And on the first day, maybe youdon't identify as a writer and
maybe you don't on the secondday or the twentieth or the
fiftieth. But at some point,maybe it's six months or twelve
months or two years later,you've been showing up every day
and writing a sentence. And soyou start to identify as, yeah,
I'm the type of person thatwrites every day. That's just
what I do. And, so I think it'sthat consistency in small ways
(09:08):
that sort of the way I like tophrase it is every action you
take casts a vote for the typeof person that you believe that
you are.
And so even when you're doingsmall things, one push up,
reading one page, meditating forone minute, you're casting a
vote for being a person whodoesn't miss workouts or for
being a meditator, for being areader. And, eventually, once
(09:28):
those votes accumulate and pileup, you start to actually
believe that that's who you are.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
You talk a lot about in your book and in your writing
about and this sort of leadsinto what you were just talking
to into this but making tinyeasy changes that deliver big
results and of making thecomparison to like compounding
interest or 1% changes that likemay not seem like a lot today
and over a month or so but inover weeks and months, they can
(09:56):
add up to a lot. Khasu, can youtalk a little bit about that?
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Well, habits are the compound interest of self
improvement and what I mean bythat phrase is the same way that
money multiplies throughcompound interest, the effects
of your habits multiply as yourepeat them across time. So you
know, you have money and you'resaving a little bit for like
retirement, well, you know, yousave a hundred bucks or
something, it doesn't reallyfeel like a whole lot. You're
(10:20):
like, well, I can't retire onthat, you know, like it's it
doesn't seem to make muchdifference. And that's
especially true in the earlydays, you know, you got those
early months, you're in yourtwenties and thirties or
whatever, and you're kind oftrying to accumulate a little
bit and save. And you're like,man, you know, this is gonna
take forever.
But then in the later years, youget a a decade or two in, you
start to hit that hockey stickportion of the curve. It starts
(10:41):
to compound in a surprising wayand, you know, you turn around,
you're surprised by how much theportfolio is growing. And,
habits are not exactly likethat. It's not it's not a
mathematical equation in thesame, you know, way. Mhmm.
But they man, they can feel likethat a lot of the time. And I
think what is true and what'svery similar between compound
interest and finance and kind ofthe compound interest of self
(11:03):
improvement is that the greatestgains, the greatest results are
delayed. And that's kind of acom a hallmark of any
compounding process. You don'thave a whole lot in the
beginning, doesn't seem likevery much, seems insignificant
at first, but if you keepshowing up, it really compounds
and takes off over time. And,you know, you can look at almost
any habit like that.
(11:24):
Reading one book today is fairlyinsignificant, doesn't mean a
whole lot. But a commitment tolifelong reading, well, that can
be transformative. Then you getthis kind of compound effect of
knowledge over time. Or, youknow, what is the difference
between eating a burger andfries for lunch or eating a
salad? On any given day, it'snot really a whole lot.
(11:45):
You know, your body looksbasically the same in the
mirror. The scale doesn't reallychange. But if you repeat that
habit for two years or fiveyears or ten years, well then
you turn around and you're verysurprised by, you know, oh wow,
those daily choices really wereadding up. So I think that
that's kind of the ultimatetruth or that that kernel of
truth about compounding andhabits, which is they can feel
(12:06):
insignificant in bothdirections, getting 1% better or
1% worse on any given day. Mhmm.
But if you can master thatlittle advantage, then you put
time to work for you rather thanagainst you. And so that's why,
you know, sometimes I'll say,like, time magnifies the margin
between success and failure. Itit multiplies whatever you feed
(12:28):
it. So good habits make timeyour ally and bad habits make
time your enemy and if you canmaster that and capture that
little 1% improvement each day,you'll end up surprised you
know, two or five or ten yearslater at where you're at.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
I love that. Breaking bad habits versus sticking or
starting good habits, is there adifference in the approach to
breaking habit versus startingor sticking to a good habit?
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Yeah, mean I think there is. To a certain degree,
they're kind of two sides to thesame coin, but there are some
differences. So when you'rebuilding a good habit, when
you're trying to build a newhabit, it's not Well first let's
just set the stage. So what isthe definition of a habit? So a
habit is a behavior that hasbeen repeated enough times to be
(13:16):
more or less automatic.
So you can do it pretty much onautopilot. So like brushing your
teeth, tying your shoes,unplugging the toaster after
each use. And then, you know,it's not just physical things,
it also can be habits of thoughtor things that you say. So, you
know, maybe you don't realizethat you apologize each time
before you ask a question. Oh,I'm sorry, but, you know,
whatever.
Or that you cover your mouthevery time before you laugh, or
(13:40):
that you have a certain, like,mental loop that you get into or
anxiety habit that you get intowhen a certain things happens or
whatever. So there are all kindsof habits like that. But the
point is that you have repeatedthem enough times that you kind
of slide into them naturally bydefault on autopilot without
thinking about it. Now when itcomes to building a good habit,
(14:01):
well, the behavior is notautomatic yet. It hasn't been
built yet.
So one of the key factors inbuilding a good habit is
repeating it enough times togain, like, fluency and fluidity
and, you know, gain, the abilityto make it routine because it's
not that yet. But then when youthink about breaking a bad
habit, well, many of our badhabits are, by definition,
(14:24):
they're already habits. Right?They've been established.
They're already automatic.
You bite your fingers withoutthinking about it, or you tore
your hair even though you don'tnotice, or you, you know, fall
into this, anxiety trap withoutbefore you even realize that
you're And so bad habits are arekind of like already
nonconscious and automatic. Andso one of the challenges with
(14:45):
those is becoming aware of themat first. So bad habits kind of
require a lot of self awarenessin the beginning because you
don't even realize that you'redoing it. And then if we can
combine these two, so you've gotyou've got the good habit,
you're really trying to focuson, like, get the reps in, make
it routine, make it automatic,and then you've got the bad
habit, it's already automatic.How do I make it maybe more
(15:06):
conscious or realize or becomeself aware of it?
They can you know, there areother strategies for breaking
bad habits, like you can justeliminate it outright or you can
try to curtail it by reducingsome of the triggers that prompt
it, things like that. But youcan also and we can talk about
more of that stuff if you'dlike. But, but when it comes to
(15:29):
building, good habits, sometimesI think the most effective way
to break a bad habit is just tofocus on building a good one.
You don't even really worryabout the bad habit. So like
let's say for example, that youhave, that you have a bad habit
of watching like too much TVwhen you get home from work or
playing video games orsomething.
You get home and you turn on thescreen and then you just zone
out for a few hours. Well, youcould focus on a bunch of ways
(15:51):
to try to break that habit, youknow, you like hide the video
game controller, figure outstrategies for how to break
stuff like that. But you couldalso say, well, there is a good
habit I wanna build, which is Iwanna get in shape. I wanna
start exercising more. And sorather than even think you don't
even think about the screenthing, video games or TV.
And you just say, alright, I'mgonna focus on the new habit of
(16:14):
when I get home from work, Ichange into my workout clothes.
And then after I change into myworkout clothes, I head to the
gym. Well, if you can start tomaster that habit, make exercise
easier, get into the, the flowof doing that. Well, when you're
at the gym, you've kind of havealready taken care of like an
hour of that video game habit.You know, you can't play it
because you're at the gym doingsets and reps.
(16:36):
Right? Like you're not evenyou're not even thinking about
the TV because you're somewhereelse doing something else.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
And basically, the lesson here is that everybody
only has twenty four hours in aday. And so a lot of the time,
kinda like one plant crowdingout another and taking up the
sunlight and nutrients in thesoil, good habits can crowd out
your bad ones automatically. Andso sometimes I think it's more
useful just to focus on thepositive side of the equation
(17:01):
and build some good ones andthen your bad ones fall by the
wayside naturally. It doesn'talways work, but sometimes that
can be helpful.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Now everyone also gets off track when they want to
start a new habit such asrunning in this case. What do
you do when you get off course?What are the approaches you
would recommend people take whenthey miss a day or two of
running, they're sick or theyjust feel lazy that day or
(17:28):
they've been busy and their kidshave lots of stuff going on,
they can't run. What do yourecommend when people get off
course?
Speaker 2 (17:34):
You know, if you think about it from like a
overall perspective or a highlevel, there really are only two
things that you have to do tothink about your habits. You
need to master the art ofgetting started, so you have to
figure out how to make it easyto get started and then you have
to figure out how to stick. Sogetting started on a habit and
sticking to a habit, those arereally the only two things, from
a big big overall view thatmatter. And then if you think
(17:58):
about it even further, you zoomout like one level higher than
that, really sticking to a habitjust means that you get started
on it each day. So really theonly problem to solve is getting
started.
If you can make it easy to getstarted each day, you'll
automatically stick to it. Andif it's easy to get started,
then and you're sticking to it,then you don't have anything
else to worry about becauseyou're doing it all the time.
(18:19):
So, so I think a lot of thiscomes back to making it easy to
start, reminding yourself tostart, getting over the friction
of starting day in and day out.So, you know, I guess we could
just summarize it as saying, ahabit simply means a behavior
that you get started on each dayMhmm. Or consistently.
So if that's true and then youfind that you have fallen off
(18:42):
course, as you just said in yourquestion, then the only thing to
focus on when you fall off trackis making it easy to start
again. And, there are a coupledifferent things you can do. You
know, we already mentioned thetwo minute rule, so scale it
down. If you've, let's say, forexample, in the case of running,
let's say you've been runningfor, like, two months and you've
been consistent, you've beendoing it three days a week or
(19:04):
something, and, and then yourkids get sick or you have to
travel for work for a week orwhatever it is, something takes
you off track and you didn't getany running in that week. So now
you've you have this backslideand sometimes people feel like,
oh, I need to get right back towhere I was before or they
realize, oh man, I'm already Ialready lost some progress, you
(19:25):
know, like, not gonna be able tofinish the full workouts this
week that I was supposed to dolast week.
And that can make them feellike, oh, I've already blown it.
And, instead, I would say, don'tworry about coming right back in
at the level you were at. Youcan just if you have trouble
getting started again, scaleback down to that two minute
version. You know, just put onyour running shoes and get out
(19:46):
the door, or do the workout thatyou were doing the first week
rather than, you know, threedays ago. So, focusing on
scaling it down can help a lot.
But the real mantra that I thatI like to keep in mind and the
philosophy that sort of helps meget back on track and get
started after I slide off courseis never miss twice. So, you
(20:07):
know, this is particularlypowerful, I think, for like
diets and there are certain typeof habits that people get very
all or nothing about forwhatever reason, know, like
diets are, it's like, all right,picked this diet plan and I'm
gonna stick to it and they do itfor five days and then on the
sixth day, their friends wannago to happy hour or they binge
eat a pizza or something. Andthey're like, oh, you know, I
(20:29):
knew I was gonna blow it, Iguess I'm not cut out for this
diet, which is so interesting,right? That like you do
something five out of six days,but you think like, oh, I'm not
cut out for it. Yeah.
For whatever reason, we we justget very like, it's either a %
or it's zero.
Speaker 1 (20:43):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (20:43):
And and, so never miss twice is a mantra that
kinda helps overcome that whereyou say, alright. I wish I
hadn't binge ate the pizza, butnever missed twice. So let me
make sure the next meal is ahealthy one. Or in my case, for
a long time, you know, I waswriting articles for the first
few years. When I startedJamesClear.com, I was writing
(21:05):
every Monday and Thursday.
Well, if I missed on Thursday, Iwish that hadn't happened, but
never missed twice. So let memake sure that I show up and get
something out on Monday. And, ithelps you get over that
perfectionism trap, that all ornothing trap, and ultimately it
just nudges you to do that onething that matters which is how
(21:26):
can I make sure I get startednext time and so I think that
that's can be one helpful way todeal with that?
Speaker 1 (21:31):
Yeah, the never miss twice is great. Yeah and that's
sort of what I reinforce with myrunners than under run
participants is just like it'sokay to miss a workout and you
know, just come back and if youneed to scale back, do it and
just you know get back on thehorse and you haven't ruined or
(21:52):
lost all your fitness and justbecause you missed one or two
workouts by any means. I lovethat, never miss twice. Okay,
let's move into the nextsection. So I just want to walk
through sort of a typical nonrun participant and, I thought
it might be cool to sort ofprofile, give them a sort of an
(22:12):
avatar and then we could, youcould walk through some some
quick tips for this person basedon your sort of your four laws
of behavior change and thosebeing one make it obvious, two
make it attractive, three makeit easy, and four make it
satisfying.
So a typical participant comingin an under run program, they
(22:34):
might be overweight, may or maynot be overweight, they want to
improve their diet, they'rebusy, they've got you know one,
two, three kids, they work afull time job, motivation and
time is lacking at times butthey really want to start
running. So there's lots goingon, there's lots of change
required but perhaps we can walkthrough based on the four laws
(22:58):
of behavior change sort of whatthis person can do to set
themselves up for success.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
Yeah, so first of all, me set the context a little
bit. So you know, in the book Italk about kind of dividing a
habit into four stages, cue,craving, response, reward. I
won't explain it all in detailright here. If you wanna get the
full explanation, can check out,chapter three of the book. But
the point is that dividing ahabit into these four stages
(23:27):
allows us to understand betterhow a habit works and what we
can do to change it.
And so each of these four laws,each one addresses one of those
four steps. So, in the case of,like, for example, make it
obvious, the idea is to make thecues that trigger and prompt
your good habits as obvious andavailable and visible as
(23:47):
possible. And then for each ofthe four laws, you can invert it
if you wanna break a bad habit.So you make the cues invisible
instead of making it obvious foryour bad habits. So it's how can
we hide those cues, reducedistractions, reduce exposure,
and so and, and so on.
So, in the case of, like, thisprototypical runner who would
(24:09):
come into the known to runprogram, I think the one of the
first things to to do, we canfocus on the third law of
behavior change, making it easy.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
So in order to make running easy, especially if
you're busy, you got a couplekids or things are just crazy at
work, you have this very packedschedule. So the first element
of this is simplicity. I findthat a lot of time, you know,
behaviors are sort of tied toeach other in the sense that you
change one thing and thatreminds you of something else
(24:41):
you'd like to change too. Right?So may you might have people
come in and say, oh, alright, Iwanna start running and I'm also
gonna stretch consistently andI'm gonna change my diet and,
start meditating or whatever,right?
They they like wanna do all ofthese health habits as a
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Complete life overhaul.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
And, and I and I think that's natural. As soon as
you start to get motivated aboutone change, you start thinking
about all the other stuff youwanna do. And you know, it's
kinda kinda comes in and you, asyou said, you try to do this
complete overhaul thing. So whatI think people often don't
realize is that when you try tochange one thing, you often need
(25:20):
to change multiple. So let'ssay, for example, that you're
gonna build the habit of eatinghealthy.
Well, you might say, alright,I'm just gonna focus on this one
habit. I'm gonna eat healthy.But actually, you need to change
like five other related habitsfor that to happen. Right? You
need to change your mealplanning and prep habits.
You need to change your groceryshopping habits so you're buying
(25:43):
better food. You may need tochange your cooking habits and,
like, chopping and preparationof the food. After you get done
eating the meal, you need tochange your cleaning habits and
you know, because you're cookingmore meals at home rather than
eating out or whatever. Inreality, like the actual habit
you're trying to do, eating ahealthy meal, that's like eating
the meals, easy part. It's likeall this other stuff that's
related to it.
(26:03):
Mhmm. And I think we couldprobably say that many people
who are trying to build thishabit of running are facing a
similar situation where, theactual run itself is maybe the
easy part, especially if youscale it down and start small.
It's all the other stuff relatedto it, finding the time and
space to do it, making sure thatI take care of my
(26:25):
responsibilities with my family,before I'm, you know, trying to
go out on this run or whatever.Figuring out what kind of
program I'm gonna be following.I don't even know what I you
know, and now I need to changemy habits of, researching
workout programs and things.
So there's a lot of extralogistical stuff that goes along
with doing just one habit. So mymy key point with that is
(26:48):
simplicity. Focusing on just onething, let the meditation and
the stretching and the dietchanges and all that stuff, let
it sit to the side for now.Let's just think about running.
Then the second piece of makingthat easy is scaling it down so
that it's not intimidating.
So that you feel like, you know,if I was gonna ask myself, you
got this busy schedule, I'mgonna ask myself to go for a
(27:10):
forty five minute run three daysa week, they're gonna be when
I'm motivated, when I have thetime and the space, I'll make it
happen. But as soon as the daygets busy, then I start looking
at my calendar and my clock andI think, ugh, I don't have forty
five minutes, right? I got tenminutes. Mhmm. So, I think the
level that you want to scaledown to, the question to ask
yourself if your habit is easyenough or not, is can I do this
(27:34):
98% of the time no matter whatthe conditions without fail?
And if you can't do it thatfrequently, that consistently,
then it's too big. At least inthe beginning, right, at least
at the very start. All we'reagain, in the beginning, all
we're trying to do is master theart of showing up. Become the
type of person that gets yourrunning shoes on and gets out
the door, even if it only meansthat it's at 10:00 after you put
(27:57):
your kids to bed and all you dois run around the block and then
come back inside. But you haveto like find a way to become
that person that's showing upconsistently first.
So make it easy is a big part ofthat. I guess I'll pause there
and then we can dive into theother three. I just want to see
if you got other stuff to add orwant me to expand on any
particular part.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
No, I think that's good. Yeah, just just carry on
your train of thought there,this is great.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
So so making it easy and staying simple and focused,
I think is a good place tostart. Then we can kind of go
through these other threestages, right? So the first law
of behavior change is to make itobvious. Well, you can ask
yourself, what are the thingsthat I need, that make running
obvious to me? What are the cuesthat prompt that habit?
(28:41):
So maybe it's seeing your waterbottle filled. Maybe it's seeing
your running shoes sitting bythe door. Maybe it's, the route
that you're gonna run mapped outon your phone, and you can like
check that throughout the dayand remind yourself where you're
gonna be running or whatever.But no matter what it is, there
are gonna be some cues that kindof prompt and remind and
motivate you to get started onthat habit. And I think the the
(29:04):
key thing to think about here isyou wanna prime the environment
so that all that stuff is readyand visible and available for
you.
So I actually have a couplereaders who, you know, a lot of
people I think will prep theirgym bag the night before or set
their running shoes out by thedoor so that they can see them
right away when they get up, ifthey're trying to go for a run
(29:25):
or workout in the morning. Iactually have some readers who
will wear their running clothesto bed. Wow. All they have to do
is roll out of bed, put theirfeet in their shoes and then
step out the
Speaker 1 (29:35):
door. I love that.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
And, so that's those are examples of not only making
it obvious, but making it again,that third law, making it easy,
right? Making it as easy aspossible, as convenient as
possible to slide into thishabit. So that's an example of
how to apply the first law ofbehavior change. I I also wanna
add while I'm talking aboutthis, it can be helpful to think
(29:58):
about the inverse of each lawand how it might be preventing
you from moving forward. So whenit comes to the cues of your
good habits of running, likeseeing your shoes or your water
bottle and so on, those helpnudge you forward.
But it also might be worth thingworth asking, what are the cues
that distract me? What are thethings that pull me off course?
(30:19):
And can I make those cues lessobvious, less available, less
visible? You know, you may find,for example, that, you wake up
in the morning and you turn offyour alarm on your phone, and
the first thing you do is youtap the email icon, and then you
start scrolling through youremail. And you may find that
that cue of seeing the emailicon and scrolling through that,
(30:41):
the habit of scrolling throughyour phone, that if you start to
see emails from your boss andwork related stuff or whatever,
that either you start to getanxious or overthink, you know,
start thinking about what youneed to do for the day, or you
may just find that that pullsyou into work immediately.
Know, you go take a shower andyou just immediately start doing
all the stuff you need to do andit like swallows up that forty
(31:01):
five minutes that you would havehad Mhmm. To go for a run. And
so perhaps you should askyourself, well, can I cut that
cue out? You know, like maybemaybe it's more useful to charge
your phone in the kitchen thanin your bedroom and buy an
actual alarm clock and put itright next to your bed.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
And now when you wake up, you turn the alarm off, but
you don't tap on the email icon.You're not reading emails before
you've even taken a step. And,and maybe you, you know, turn
off the alarm, get out of bed,go for a run for a half hour,
come back, take a shower, andstart your day, and then you
check the email. But my point isthat it's not only useful to
make the cues of your goodhabits obvious, it's also can be
(31:40):
very helpful to make thedistractions, invisible. So,
restructuring your environmentin that way can be useful as
well.
Alright. So that's the firstlaw. We talked about making it
obvious. We talked about thethird law, making it easy. The
other two, make it attractiveand make it satisfying.
So making your habits moreattractive, making them more
(32:02):
appealing is really about themeaning that you assign to the
behavior. So, let me, let megive you an example. Okay. Let's
say that you go to bed and youthink, alright, tomorrow's gonna
be the day, right? I'm gonnawake up at six, I'm gonna go for
a run early, and I'm gonna go towork.
(32:23):
You go to sleep, 6AM rollsaround, and your bed is warm,
it's cold outside, and you'relike, well, maybe I'll just hit
snooze instead. But if yourewind the clock and, you send a
text to a friend the day before,and you say, hey. Can we meet at
the park at 06:30 and go for arun? Well, now 6AM rolls around
(32:44):
and your bed is still warm andstill cold outside, but if you
don't get out and go to thepark, you're a jerk because you
leave your friend there allalone. Right?
So that's what, psychologistscall this a commitment device.
It's like a choice that you makenow that helps lock in your
behavior for the future. Andthat's one way to make habits
more attractive, right? Suddenlyit's more appealing to wake up
(33:07):
at 6AM than it was previously.Because now if you don't get up,
there's like a cost associatedwith that behavior.
And so making your habitsattractive is kind of like about
re it's about shifting thatanalysis in your head. Like, oh,
what does 6AM mean? How howattractive is it now? And, and
(33:29):
little strategies like that canhelp nudge you along, you know,
and, and help lock in yourfuture behavior and make it more
likely that you fall through.So, commitment devices are a
helpful way to make habits moreattractive.
And then finally, we have thefourth law of behavior change,
make it satisfying. So reallywhat this is all about, and this
(33:49):
is what helps get a habit tostick in the long run, is you
want to feel successful once youfinish the habit. The completion
of the habit should besatisfying, enjoyable,
pleasurable. The more that youhave positive emotions and
feelings associated with thefinish of the habit, the more
you're training your brain andteaching yourself, hey, this
(34:11):
felt good. I should do thisagain next time.
You know, like if you feel badafter you finish habit, well,
nobody wants to repeat that.Right? So, there are a couple
things you can do here. And Ithink that you can think about
it both on a short term orimmediate gratification
timescale and a long term orultimate outcome timescale. So
(34:31):
the ultimate outcome of goingfor a run consistently is great.
You get in shape. You startstart to feel good about
yourself, you lose a little bitof weight, you start to identify
as I'm a runner. But most ofthose rewards that I just
described, they don't come for awhile. Right? They don't come
until three or six or twelvemonths later.
Like, you need to stick with itfor a while. Mhmm. And so
(34:54):
there's this valley of deathfrom the beginning of a habit
until that ultimate outcome,those ultimate rewards start to
accumulate and show up. And inthat valley, in that gap there
from when you start to when youstart to identify as a runner
and get those long term rewards,it can be helpful to have some
external motivators, someexternal rewards that get you
(35:15):
through that period. So, youknow, for example, you could
say, at the end of each weekwhen I do all of my running,
let's say you're running threedays a week.
For every week that I get mythree days in, on Saturday, I
get to take a bubble bath. Andso the reason I like that is
because it you could alsoimagine other external rewards
(35:37):
like, people do this withexercise a lot. After I do my
workout, I reward myself with amilkshake or a, you know, a bowl
of ice cream or something. Well,the the external reward is
there, but I don't like thatstrategy because you're casting
conflicting votes. Right?
Like on the one hand, you'revoting for I am a healthy
person, I worked out.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
On the other hand, you're voting for I eat ice
cream. And so what you'relooking for is an external
reward that aligns with orreinforces your desired
identity. And so that's why Ilike, for example, the bubble
bath, option, because bothtaking a bubble bath and going
for a run are casting a vote forI'm taking care of my body. And
(36:20):
it doesn't always have to alignperfectly like that, but at a
minimum, don't want the externalreward to conflict with who
you're trying to be become. Sothat kind of gives you a
overview of how to apply, makeit obvious, make it attractive,
make it easy, make it satisfyingand use those four laws of
behavior change to improve theodds or increase the odds that
(36:43):
you'll fall through on the run.
Speaker 1 (36:45):
I love that. Thanks for walking through that for us.
Okay, the last part of theconversation here, I've got a
couple, two looks like threequestions. Some of the
questions, some of theinformation you may have touched
upon but we'll go through themanyway here. The first question
is from Nicole Park and shesays, What tips do you have
(37:05):
about adding on to habits?
If I set my habit goalsrealistically enough, I can
usually stick to the first verysmall habit but as soon as I add
another or up the ante, I can'tseem to stick to either habit.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Yeah that's a good question. Okay so there are two
possible strategies that I cantake here. So first strategy is
if and this sounds like whatshe's trying to do, if you want
to perform multiple habits. AndI think the answer here is to
try to find the right time andlocation to insert each habit
(37:40):
into your life, and then keepthem small enough that you can
make a little stack out of them.So, this is a strategy that in
the book I refer to as habitstacking.
I first learned about it from BJFogg. He's this professor at
Stanford. And the basic idea isthat you stack or add one habit
on top of another. So let's saythat you're, you can create,
(38:05):
like, a morning productivitystack, for example. And let's
say that you always make a cupof coffee every morning.
Well, you could say, after Imake my morning cup of coffee, I
will meditate for sixty seconds.And then you're like, alright, I
did that for a few weeks, andthat's easy, which is what she's
mentioning in this question.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
Mhmm.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
And now I think, okay. Not only do I wanna
meditate, I also want to startjournaling. Well, the key here
is to make sure that themorning, first of all, is the
right time of day to do this foryou. You know, you can imagine,
for example, if you have littlekids, like your four year old
doesn't care at all if you'retrying to meditate. They're just
running around and, you know,you're trying to get people
(38:43):
ready for school and whatever.
So maybe the morning is not theright time for that habit. But
let's assume that it is. Youneed to keep it small enough
that you can build this littlestack. So you could say, after I
make my morning cup of coffee, Iwill meditate for sixty seconds.
After I meditate for sixtyseconds, I will journal one
sentence about what happenedyesterday.
After I journal one sentence, Iwill write my to do list for the
(39:04):
day and start working on thefirst task. And, so now you have
this little morning productivitystack, right, where you've got,
like, three little things. Imeditate, I journal, and I do my
to do list. And they all canhappen in rapid succession
building on each other, andthey're short enough that you
can actually stick to them. Soso the scale and the scope is
important there, and so is thetiming and asking yourself to do
(39:27):
it at the right time of day.
So that's the first strategy.The second strategy, though, is
to say, alright. I'm not gonnaadd multiple things to my life.
So I'm not going to bothmeditate and journal and do the
to do list. I'm just gonna pickone habit to focus on.
So let's say, for example, that,that writing is the important
(39:49):
habit that you're gonna you'regonna focus around. Well, the
same thing happens as what she'smentioning here. You start
writing and you say, alright.I'm gonna write one sentence
each day. And you do that for, Idon't know, a month or two, and
then all of a sudden it getsboring.
You're like, alright, I I'mwriting a sentence every day,
but, you know, it's I'm used toit. I know what to expect,
whatever. Well, the thing to dothen is not to add another
(40:13):
habit, a separate unrelatedhabit. It's to find a new detail
to get obsessed with orinterested in. And so you're
still asking yourself to do thecore fundamental, but, but
you're finding a new way to befascinated with the behavior.
So let's take, say you're like,alright, you know, I've been
writing a hundred words a day,and, now I start to know to know
(40:35):
what to expect. So for the nextfew weeks, my little 1%
improvement, the area I'm gonnafocus on improving is I'm gonna
try to write great openingsentences. And so maybe I'll
pick a few books off the shelf,and I'll look at how they the
opening sentence for eachchapter. Maybe I'll go to the
New York Times and see what thepopular articles are in that
site, and, like, look at whatthe opening sentences are there.
(40:56):
And that kinda becomes myresearch for trying to improve
my own opening sentences.
And after you do that and addthat into your habit for, you
know, the next few weeks, thenyou pick a different thing to
focus on. Maybe now you'refocused on transitions between
paragraphs or on a greatconcluding sentence or things
like that. And, my point here,whether it's writing or running
(41:18):
is another good thing you like.Maybe one, for a few weeks,
focus on hand placement whileyou're running or on foot strike
or on your stride length or, youknow, breathing, a ton of other
right there, like an infiniterange of things you could think
about. Mhmm.
But you are sticking to the samefundamentals, but you're finding
a new detail to be interestedin. And I think the advantage of
(41:39):
that is that it prevents youfrom jumping from habit to
habit. You know, there are somany people who do things like,
alright. I write for six weeks,then I got bored. Well, maybe I
shouldn't write.
Maybe I should start a podcast.And then I do a podcast for six
weeks, then I didn't get bored.Well, maybe I should do a
YouTube channel or whatever. Butthey're never sticking with
anything long enough to gettheir results. And so, finding
(42:00):
new details to be fascinatedwith is a good way of overcoming
that barrier and, continuing toexpand your habit and scope, but
maintaining the interest in thatcore fundamental that really
matters.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
That's great. Nicole also asked, any tips on how to
get back up from a perceivedfailure? Well I think you, you
tackled that a little bitearlier in the conversation so
we'll we'll move on to the nextone here. And this question is
from Kate Reid. She says, James,my best chance to run is in the
morning as I don't govern whenmy workdays end but I'm not a
(42:36):
morning person by any stretch ofimagination.
Takes me a good forty fiveminutes to wake up to any kind
of functional level. How can Imake this work?
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Yeah, that's a good question. So it's tough but I
would say that the commitmentdevice idea that I shared
earlier, so whether that'stexting a friend to run with
them or joining a running clubor, otherwise meeting somebody,
tends to be enough of a socialmotivator to get you out of bed
(43:05):
if you don't feel like that'swhat you naturally would do.
Right? If left to your owndevices and you don't feel like
a morning person, you might justhit snooze and, you know, like,
not make it happen. But thesocial cost is enough to to make
it work.
And that was her question, like,how can I make it work? Well,
that's one way. So increasingthe consequence that you feel.
If you're not in a position or aplace, or don't, you know, don't
(43:27):
have a group like that that youcould join or people that you
could meet, you can also try, aninteresting, technological
solution. So I, I came across astory of this one guy who he
wanted to to start waking upearlier.
He wanted to wake up at 6AM eachday, but he just was the same
(43:49):
thing. He wasn't a morningperson. It was a struggle. So he
set up a an automated schedule,an automatic tweet to go out at
06:05. And that tweet would say,I'm not awake yet because I'm
lazy.
The first five people to replyto this, I will pay PAYU $20.
And and so that went out at06:05. So he would wake up at
(44:12):
six, and the first thing hewould do is turn off his alarm
clock and then reschedule thetweet for the next day. And so
as long as he was waking up oron time, he was always able to
move the tweet back a day. And,and that was enough, of course,
to get him up and out of bed.
And then once he was out of bed,the rest kinda fell in line. So,
it's possible that you could dosomething like that. Like, maybe
(44:33):
you could schedule the tweet,charge your phone in the
kitchen. And so by the time youwake up and get down to the
kitchen and schedule the tweetfor the next day, now it's like
alright, I've already put inenough work, let me just grab a
cup of coffee and then go for arun. Little things like that
might be enough to get youmoving to make it happen.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
I like that and I definitely like the social cost.
In the summer here in Toronto,I'm part of a cycling club
actually and we meet at one ofthe sort of big parks at 05:20
or 05:30 in the morning and I'vegot two buddies I ride with and
I know they're waiting for me atthe top of my street at 05:30
sharp, I got to be there. So thesocial cost is it definitely
(45:18):
works for me and yeah, it's agood strategy.
Speaker 2 (45:22):
It's actually remarkable how meaningful of a
driver the social environment isfor our habits. I think you
know, I I have a whole chapteron this in atomic habits, and I
think even still, I undersoldthe importance of it. So many of
the behaviors that we performare a response to the groups
that we belong to. And, so beingpart of that cycling group, it
(45:45):
changes your morning routine.Right?
It changes whether you wake up.And the same thing is true for
all kinds of of habits that wedo each day. Know? Like, if you
if you move into this is true inbig and small ways. I mean, if
you move into a new neighborhoodand you walk outside and you see
all your neighbors have theirrecycling bins out on Wednesday
night, well, you're like, oh, Iguess we need to sign up for
(46:06):
recycling.
That's what everybody like usdoes here, you know? And those
little social nudges andreinforcements are all around us
and, if you can get in with theright group or the right tribe,
then you can start to put thatpeer pressure to work for you
rather than against you. It canbe a very, beneficial and
positive force when when you'resurrounded by the right folks.
Speaker 1 (46:29):
Yeah, I agree, very powerful. So we should wrap up
just to be conscious of our timehere and your time. Is there any
tools or habit trackers yourecommend? Know there's a sort
of a supplementary paper basedhabit tracking like is it a
journal that you have that sortof accompanies your book or is
(46:49):
there anything else that yourecommend and yeah.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Yeah, so I wrote Atomic Habits that's kind of the
comprehensive guide on howhabits work and how to change
them, you know, gives you a lotof the, strategies we talked
about today, and you know, abunch of other ones that we
didn't have time to get into.And then as a compliment to
that, we created what I call thehabit journal, and, it's got a
section in the front that has alot helps you build a journaling
(47:15):
habit and kinda write one lineper day. So there's 12 pages
there, so one for each month.And then the bulk of the
notebook is just a regularnotebook. You can use it to help
you use any other notebook.
It's a dot grid. You know, youcan fill I I use it to record my
workouts in, but you could useit for whatever you want. And
then at the back of thenotebook, there are 12 habit
tracker templates. So again, onefor each month of the year, and,
(47:37):
you can write down the habitthat you're performing and then
each day, there's 31 cells youcan, you know, check off or
shade in each day, of the monththere and then tally your total
at the end and so on. You know,I have to say, it's funny
because I I've been writingabout this stuff for a long time
and the journal just came out afew months ago, but I've really
enjoyed using it.
It's been a little bit of asurprise to me. I have never had
(47:59):
a consistent journaling habit,and this was the first time that
I, you know, the first monththat I used it, I journaled 30
out of 30 one days. So it'skinda nice to see the principles
in practice and see that they,you know, they do work. And the
so the habit journal is a nicecomplement to Atomic Habits and,
a good manual way to put some ofthose ideas into practice. But
then, you know, there are also avariety of apps and stuff for
(48:23):
your phone.
I I don't have any particularone that I tend to recommend.
Mhmm. I actually I actuallythink that a lot of the habit
apps don't work that well, but,we'll see. I have a lot of
people asking if I'll design oneat some point. I don't know.
Maybe we will, but I don't haveany immediate plans to to do it,
but we'll see what happens. Butfor now, the Atomic Habits and
(48:44):
the Habit Journal are kind of myone two punch.
Speaker 1 (48:46):
That's great. So where can listeners find out
more about your book and theHabit Journal and then the other
work, your writings that you do?
Speaker 2 (48:56):
Well, you can find all my stuff at jamesclear.com
and, if you click on articles,you can just kind of poke around
there and see what interestsyou. If you feel like signing up
to the newsletter, you can dothat as well. And if you click
on books, then you'll see bothAtomic Habits and the Habit
Journal and if you want to justgo straight to the book and find
the best place to grab a copy,you can just go to
(49:17):
AtomicHabits.com.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
Awesome. Well James, thanks so much for joining us
today and hopefully the nexttime we speak is in another six
years from now.
Speaker 2 (49:28):
Yeah, I hope so. Thank you so much, I appreciate
it.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
Thanks James.
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