Good Habits Die Hard – Day 48

11 May 2021 – day 48 of my personal 66 day challenge to become a blogger here on WordPress, while doing some research on the concept of beneficial habit formation.

Sarah Stevenson suggests that it is beneficial to listen to music that makes you happy. I can definitely relate to that. Every day in May each year, I start my day with Ave Maria, because it is an awesome song. Another song I listen to to make me happy is any song sung by number 1 son, Mark.

Sarah also suggests that it is a good habit to have an evening wind down routine. So often we are still mentally connected to the TV, laptop or mobile, as we get into bed and this makes it more difficult to settle and have a restful night. Tiny habits, such as having a shower, an herbal tea, reading a light hearted book are all ways of signalling to your brain that it is time to rest. My daughter, Laura, bought me Salix Moon Pillow Potion, which is a blend of Lavender, Frankincense and Bergamot in a spray….I’m feeling sleepy already : )

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 47

10 May 2021 – Day 47 of my personal 66 challenge to become a blogger here on WordPress while doing research on habit formation.

You might be wondering, dear reader, how I am managing to suddenly write consistently every day. Well, it is because I am am using the Tiny Habits technique of anchoring one tiny habit to another. I love doing some typing practice every day and as soon as I have completed my timed 30 minute practice, I open my WordPress account. Job done!

So today, I thought I would look at a more lighthearted piece of research in beneficial habit formation from Sarah Stevenson, a health and fitness guru. Sarah has some interesting habits to share. She always freezes bananas, so that she can use them in nutritious smoothies. How clever is that? I always wait until they become over ripe and make Banana Cake : ) Sarah also insists that it is a good habit to care for something or someone in your life. This is so true. For me, I’m always happy when I keep up to date with what’s going on in my 4 children’s lives and the lives of their families. Also, I care about my friends and love to hear all their news. I care about my health, my house, my car, my bike, my garden, my job and I’m so grateful for all these wonderful people and things to care about.

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 46

09 May 2021 – Day 46 of my personal 66 day challenge to become a blogger here on WordPress, while studying the science and art of good habit formation.

Ali Abdaal is a man after my own heart. He’s a medical doctor, an entrepreneur, a professional YouTuber and a seriously clever young man who seems happy to share his knowledge with others. He encourages us all to listen to audio and podcasts at double speed. I say audio here, as there are some YouTube videos that I won’t play at double speed e.g. any of Ryan Van Duzer bike ride videos. This is because I need to savour the scenery. However, if I’m listening the the World Health Organisation Covid-19 Briefing, there is no visual content to focus on…so I ramp up the speed.

Ali’s friend Cliff Weitzman points out that speed listening is like speed typing, it needs to be mindfully done. I have recently increased my typing speed dramatically by practising on Typing Club every day. Pandemic lockdown does that to you. The same is true for listening speed increase. If you want to do it, Cliff and Ali say start slowly. You Tube settings offer this flexibility. In true Tiny Habits fashion, start by increasing to 1.25 and then increase to 1.5, 1.75 and finally double speed. It’s 11:01 on Sunday morning. I’ve done my Tai Chi, been swimming, made Irish Soda bread, done a load of washing, studied the healthcare platform, EmisWeb, done 30 minutes typing practice and written my blog. What’s next?! Oh yes – Formula 1 Barcelona!

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 45

08 May 2021 – the 45th day of my attempt to become a blogger here on WordPress, while studying the science of good habit formation.

Ideally, habits need to be fun and definitely they need to be beneficial. Ali Abdaal describes the habit, which he believes is beneficial (and, to my mind, fun), of listening to digital material at increased speed. I’ve done this for many years, but I hadn’t really considered it as a habit, but, I must admit now, that it fits the criteria. The cue to the habit of listening at speed is selecting a video which I know might be important to me, but long, and interspersed with numerous pauses. This is true for me, especially if the speaker is American, as, to my ears, Americans seem to speak more slowly and deliberately. The behaviour then, is hitting that config wheel in the bottom right hand corner, on the video or podcast, in order to to increase the speed. (I haven’t discovered where that setting is on my TV YouTube yet, so I tend to watch or listen to video/podcasts on my phone or laptop. That’s a skill to acquire from number 3 son David, when I next see him : ) )The reward of listening to things at higher speeds is as Ali describes – greater ‘input‘ and time saved : ) The Habit Loop is complete again! Yeah!

Dear reader, I do hope you clicked on that ‘input‘ link : ) Now you know you want to : )

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 44

07 May 2021 – Day 44 of my 66 day challenge to become a blogger here on WordPress, while studying habit formation.

Ali Abdaal describes how he listens to YouTube videos at double speed. I do that!! He would like to encourage us all to develop a speed listening habit. I agree! Ali himself speaks quite quickly, so I only listen to his videos at 1.75 speed : ) He says that the value of listening at faster speeds is that you can absorb greater amounts of information and, as a result, the time cost is less. I did a speed reading course in the 80s, when my 4 kids were little, because this concept made sense to me even then. I remember listening to my children read the books they brought home from school. I would sit next to them as they read and I would have read the whole page before we had settled into the settee for our session. I was doing a degree in Psychology at the time and the way we absorb written material fascinated me.

In his video discussion with Cliff Weitzman, Ali explores the way even movies have changed over the years. Nowadays, we are drawn to fast paced movies, whereas in the past, slow movies like Casablanca were what the audience looked for…Does it matter that we have made this shift to faster paced movies and faster listening, you might ask. ‘Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn’ : )

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 43

06 May 2021 – day 43 of my 66 day challenge to become a blogger here on WordPress while studying the process of habit formation.

Wendy Wood gives the example of the thrill of an ‘uncertain’ reward when we put money into a slot machine, or one of those rolling coin machines. We enjoy the behaviour and it is reinforced, at least for the time being, when we unexpectedly hit the jackpot, albeit 2p : ) Interestingly, Wendy points out that Dopamine (the pleasure chemical) is released more when rewards are uncertain. She uses this example in terms of the need for uncertain rewards to keep a relationship fresh. If you always buy flowers for the other person, this loses its uncertainty and with that, there is the loss of the release of Dopamine on receipt of the gift. I must beg to disagree slightly with this observation. My number 2 son, Alan, and his lovely wife Rebecca, send me flowers every year for my birthday. On the big day, I anticipate this gift with great joy. I must admit that the flowers themselves are always different each year and I have the pleasure of arranging them and caring for them for a few weeks. Perhaps what Wendy is referring to then, are frequent gifts of the same thing. I imagine if I got the exact same flowers every month, I might start to take them for granted. Another example of not agreeing with Wendy here, is a 6 month baking kit gift I received this year from my daughter, Laura and her wonderful husband, Chris. The box is always the same shape and size, but the contents are always different each month, so that triggers the reward based on the uncertainty of not knowing what baking treat is enclosed. This month was Olive and Rosemary Fougasse. Delicious!

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 42

05 May 2021 – the 42nd day of my personal 66 day challenge to become a blogger here on Word Press, while studying the process of habit formation.

Wendy Wood says that internally motivated, intrinsic, rewards are better than extrinsic, external, rewards. What intrinsic means, in this context, is that you enjoy the behaviour while you are doing it. In my case, I enjoy typing. For fun, I’m doing 30 minutes per day of the free version of The Typing Club. I love doing it and I have to set my alarm to stop me overdoing it. I must admit, the same is not true in relation to writing this blog. So maybe, at the end of the 66 days, I might decide to stop this particular habit. It’s important to be honest with yourself and to assess which behaviours are cherished and which are not. Wendy touches upon another type of reward which she calls an ‘uncertain reward’. She uses the example of checking your mobile phone. Most of us check incessantly, even when we have notifications set up and yet there is nothing of interest when we check. However, once in a while there is a ‘nugget’ of interest and that keeps us checking. This reminds me of how one might check the mailbox at the front of your property every day. Most days there’s nothing but then…..yeah! A letter pour moi?!

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 41

03 May 2021 – Day 41 of my 66 personal challenge to become a blogger here on WordPress, while studying the formation of beneficial habits.

Wendy Wood says we are hard wired to do things that we enjoy more regularly. This is pivotal then, in helping us to select which habits to maintain and which to let go of, and it’s ok to let go. Wendy suggests that a good strategy then is to ‘find some way to make the behaviour fun’, especially if we feel that the new habit is challenging and yet important to us. Wendy makes the distinction between ‘intrinsic’ and ‘extrinsic’ rewards. Intrinsic rewards are direct, immediate, internal beneficial rewards of doing the activity e.g. feeling energised while doing yoga, feeling refreshed as you shower, feeling elated while learning a poem off by heart. On the other hand, extrinsic rewards come from outside e.g. when she was being potty trained, I gave my daughter, Laura, a star, every time she was successful in doing her wee on the potty : ) The difference between the two types of rewards are that you can feel an ongoing, internal sense of an intrinsic reward, giving you an additional sense of ownership. Extrinsic rewards, on the other hand, may have to be waited upon and there is an additional sense of expectation and questioning as to whether you might or might not get it. For example if I had delayed Laura’s star to 30 to 60 minutes after her success, she might not have made the connection. Thank goodness I didn’t and she did : )

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 40

02 May 2021 – The 40th day of my blog here on WordPress studying habit formation.

Some habits are forced upon us, e.g. the need to set the alarm for 0645, in order to get up and ready for work. After a while, for some people, these kinds of habits become loved and comforting. They are part of who we are. They are part of our daily structure. There are part of our purpose in life. When these external habits are disrupted for any reason, e.g. illness, change of job, retirement, we can encounter internal friction in our lives. What do I do now? This then, becomes a treat and an opportunity.

Other habits are acquired and they may be ‘bad’ habits i.e. habits that are detrimental to our wellbeing…e.g. biting your nails, clicking your knuckles, overeating, drinking alcohol excessively etc.

Finally, our favourite habits, those good habits that we have lovingly chosen the aim being to better our lives. Some, like unfertile seeds, fall by the wayside, usually by 01 February each year. Others, are actually too difficult and get trodden on, as the reality of our delusional aspirations emerges. And then the fertile habits, the ones that embed and grow and make us happier and that happiness in turn, nourishes the successful habit to grow even more.

Good Habits Die Hard – Day 39

29th April 2021 – the 39th day of my attempt to become a blogger, by forming a regular habit of writing here in my WordPress account. At the same time, I’m doing research on the topic of habit formation itself. One researcher suggested that if you miss more than 2 days you will struggle to establish the habit. In my case, I have my number 3 son, David, to thank for motivating me after missing 6 days! In addition, he sent me a hard copy of BJ Fogg’s book ‘Tiny Habits’, which I am really enjoying. Much to me children’s amusement, my reading habit is already tiny : ) I am currently reading 14 books simultaneously ….a tiny habit in itself, as I only read a few pages of each book each time.

Wendy Woods suggests that you can pick up where you left off if you miss a habit for a while. She states that good habits need to have an element of fun, and maybe as life is getting busier as lockdown eases, my motivation to create this particular habit is waning….However, I am being attracted to the issue of tiny habit formation generally. For example, BJ Fogg suggests that one of the tinniest habits you can form is that when your feet touch the floor first thing in the morning you say: ‘it’s going to be a great day’. This is the secular version, but I have chosen a slight variation on this ‘Thank you God for another great day’. ….