How To Stop Procrastinating And Finally Get Started With Good Habits
Why focusing on consistency trumps perfectionism every time
“Habits are the compound interest of self-improvement” — James Clear
By now we know that long-term results can only come from implementing good habits and sticking to them.
Most of us are aware of this, but still, find it difficult to actually get started with good habits.
We ask ourselves:
Which habits should I implement? Which one to start with?
How many can I build at the same time?
How long should I do my habit each day?
How do I stop procrastinating on them?
How can I keep up my motivation to do them?
Trying to be perfect and overwhelmed by all the information out there, in the end, we don’t even start at all.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
In this article, you will get all your questions answered.
Plus, you will receive a simple framework that allows you to finally stop procrastinating and get started with good habits.
The Three Crucial Components Of Every Behavior
Before we dive into the specifics, we need to have a look at research in the field of the behavioral sciences.
One name that pops up a lot in academic circles of that field is the name of Stanford researcher BJ Fogg.
In his model, he describes that any behavior needs to have the following three components to take place consistently:
- Motivation (“Do you want to do it?”, Is it appealing?”)
- Ability (“Can you do it?”, “Is it achievable?”)
- Trigger (“Are you prompted to do it?”, “Is it activated?”)
This gives us the charming formula: B=MAT
So whenever you have problems with getting started with or sticking to your desired habit, ask yourself these three questions.
We have already had a closer look at number three, the Trigger, and how important it is to “create an environment where doing the right thing is as easy as possible”.
This helps us in getting started with good habits and makes falling for bad habits more difficult.
Let’s have a closer look at the other two factors:
1. Motivation
To get started with a new habit, it needs to be appealing to us.
Either because we like doing it or because we are motivated by the benefits that come from doing it.
Think about a habit you are trying to implement:
Do you only want to do it because others told you?
Would you enjoy the habit?
If not, can you make it more motivating by tying it to something that you enjoy do enjoy?
In general, choose a habit that really will be relevant to your long term goals and get motivated by learning about the benefits.
Remind yourself of them once you have problems following through on your habit.
Have a review system that shows you visual progress like a spreadsheet or app (like this one) where you track your habits.
Seeing the visual progress and having that reminder, gives you the motivation to get started, again and again.
Motivation And Willpower Fluctuate
However, your motivation will not always be at the same level.
You can see that fluctuation throughout the course of a day since motivation correlates with willpower.
There is the example of judges granting parole to prisoners.
As shown in the graph below, the motivation and thus likelihood that the judges granted parole correlated with the energy from food and depended on the time of the day.
Before lunch there is a huge drop, only after lunch, motivation rises again, followed by an afternoon low.
This is the concept of decision fatigue. Our willpower can be compared to a muscle, a source of energy that depletes over time. Relying only on willpower could serve in the very beginning when motivation is still very high. Whatever habit you want to start, you are excited to give it a shot and eagerly do the first steps.
Over time your willpower will decrease. This depletion can be seen over the course of several days and weeks, but also in a single day, as your willpower starts off high in the morning and declines towards the evening.
What does that mean for your habits?
The key takeaway is that you think about when you want to do your habit during your day.
The best practice would be to do difficult habits in the morning when your willpower reserves are high.
This would be deep work, doing some exercise, cold shower, reaching out to clients, writing or anything creative and demanding.
Throughout the rest of the day, especially the evening, lower the bar for your habits and make them fun and easy to start.
These would be less demanding habits, that you are more likely to enjoy, like reading a page of a book, listening to an audiobook, doing a chapter of a language course or reaching out to a couple of friends.
So What Habit To Choose?
Generally, when getting started, it’s great to choose what is called a “keystone habit”.
A keystone habit is a habit that once established can have a domino or ripple effect.
Its benefits expand to other areas of your life and over time improve it as a whole.
Charles Duhigg describes them in his book “The Power of Habit” as, “small changes or habits that people introduce into their routines that unintentionally carry over into other aspects of their lives.”
What are examples of keystone habits?
One example is “exercising.”
Regular work-outs have several side effects. You develop a better posture, feel better and have more self-confidence.
This will help you in your professional as well as social life.
It also makes you take care of your nutrition and how you treat your body. It increases self-discipline, thus affects your progress on difficult tasks, builds character and positively affects your sleep and recovery.
Other keystone habits are meditation, journaling, and visualization.
Choose Only One
The key is to focus on one keystone habits at a time.
For a behavior to become a habit, you need to give it focus and attention. If you split your attention and focus among many behaviors, it will be more difficult to make them become a habit.
Let go of the need to have it all right now. Prioritize your habits, order them and decide which one is most important and relevant to you right now.
Then draft your implementation intention for that habit and focus on it until it becomes automated.
You can later always implement and stack more habits.
Which One Is it For Me?
If you have tried a couple of habits already, but have been inconsistent, ask yourself the following questions:
What do you do on your best days? Are there any commonalities?
What patterns do you see? Which habits could be the cause of that?
Spend a few minutes reflecting and come up with a few ideas for habits that seem to be having or could have the biggest positive impact on your days and life in general.
2. Ability
Once you have chosen your habit and are motivated to do it, the second important point is your actual ability to execute on that habit.
Can I do it? Is it achievable?
This means do you know how to do the habit and do you have the time set aside to actually do it?
If you want to start journaling, you need to have a pen and paper, and some writing prompts would be great too.
If you want to meditate, a basic guided meditation would help.
If you want to work out, a training partner, personal trainer or customized plan would help you.
For all of these ask yourself:
Do I have the time set aside?
Here it is helpful to have an implementation intention where you define exactly when and for how long you will do it.
And the final and most important question for getting started with your habits is:
Are my expectations too high?
Let’s say we have the motivation, the ability, and our environment is prepared.
How do we make sure we actually get started every day and don’t overwhelm ourselves?
This leads to the key idea of this article.
The Momentum Method
What holds back many of us when it comes to new habits is perfectionism.
We want to do it perfectly right from the start.
We want to meditate for at least 20 min, write at least one full page in our journal, read at least 20 pages in a book or run at least 30 min.
We are prone to “black-and-white thinking.”
We either have good days where everything is perfect or we have bad days, where we don’t do anything at all.
This approach might work in the beginning when motivation is still very high, but after some time we realize that it is not sustainable, we overwhelm ourselves and stop doing the habit altogether.
What can we do against that?
We use what is called “The Momentum Method”.
I was first introduced to this idea by Coach Tony and his Coach.me community, a great place for people who want to build better habits.
The general idea is that with any kind of new habit, we want to focus on consistency first and increase difficulty later.
We make it easy to achieve this consistency by breaking the habit down into very small steps.
Once you start taking these tiny steps every day, you build up momentum.
With this momentum, you will build up a little streak and make it easier to stick to your habit.
You can then make adjustments, optimizations, and increases in difficulty.
This idea is very much in line with James Clear’s approach in “Atomic Habits”:
“The amount of time you have been performing a habit is not as important as the number of times you have performed it.
Standardize before you optimize. You can’t improve a habit that doesn’t exist.”
So make it easy to get started with tiny steps and even give yourself an upper limit.
Thus, you will always leave something in the tank and don’t burn out. The focus in the first weeks is just on showing up.
Examples:
I am going to write every day for at least 15 min but not more than 45 min.
I am going to go for a walk for at least 10min a day but not more than 30 min.
I am going to meditate for at least 2 minutes per day but not more than 5 min.
The purpose of focusing on tiny steps is to reduce the activation energy necessary to get a behavior going.
The Two-Minute Rule
One great way to make sure we overcome the initial resistance and kickstart our habit is to implement what James Clear calls the “two-minute rule.”
The idea is that you might not be able to complete your habit in two minutes, but any habit can be started in two minutes or less.
Let’s take the example of a daily writing habit.
Instead of focusing on writing for 30 min and getting overwhelmed by the uncomfortable feeling of not knowing what to write, you just focus on opening a word file and write one sentence.
This can be done in less than two minutes and is easy to do.
For running, don’t focus on running for 45 minutes but focus on getting your shoes, tying them and getting a water bottle.
This is the strategy to overcome any kind of procrastination because you change your mental association away from something uncomfortable and overwhelming towards something that's fun, quick and easy to do.
You again build up momentum and once you have started there is no going back.
- For a reading habit, tell yourself you will only read half a page.
- For going to the gym, tell yourself you will only look for your favorite workout shirt and put it in your gym bag.
Writing one sentence will turn into two, into a paragraph and maybe a whole page.
After reading half a page you will suddenly end up having read five pages.
After starting to pack your bag will suddenly find yourself on the way to the gym and have your workout finished before you even notice it.
This is similar to what Mark Manson calls the “Do something principle”:
Motivation only comes after taking action, so “do something” to get yourself moving, gain momentum and get started.
Think about the habit you want to build and write down a small step that is easy and only takes two minutes to get you started.
Summary
It’s ok not to be perfect in the beginning.
Just get the habit going and focus on consistency right from the start by making it easy for yourself. Prove to yourself that you can do it, no matter how small the steps.
Then simply adjust along the way.
Always remember, action has to come first, then motivation will kick in. So make it easy for yourself to take action and get going.
This is how you stay consistent and get results over the long-term.
What small steps are you going to start with?
