10 mistakes that prevent us to change
Motivation A Life / / December 19, 2019
By avoiding these mistakes, you speed up the formation of good habits and give them a firm foothold in their lives.
1. Rely on willpower
Many people in the period of inspiration are planning major changes in life, relying only on your willpower. For example, you promise yourself to eat more healthy food, engage in every day and walk more.
But willpower - is a finite resource, and the more you use it, the less remains. As a result, after two days of healthy food, exercise in the gym and walking time, you "burn" again buy dinner semi-finished products, and instead of walking watching soap operas.
Rather than rely on throughout your willpower begins to produce small good habits.
You do not have to spend on them a large supply of willpower, but when they become habits, do not need willpower. So, gradually, you will be able to purchase all the good habits that they wanted.
2. Big steps instead of small
It seems that the only recognized the great achievements and to set small goals does not make sense. Walk for two hours a day - this habit can be proud of, and a 15-minute walk such as not achieving all.
Three times a week full training in the gym instead of a half-hour workout with dumbbells at home, only healthy food instead of including in the normal diet of more fruits and vegetables.
However, experience shows that big goals are carried out two or three days, and then everything goes back to square one.
So forget about the giant plans to boldly start small. Rather than a rigid diet, replace sugary snacks and flour to apples and nuts, rather than spend two hours walking in the open air for 15 minutes and did not forget to praise yourself for progress. So you create positive associations and gradually develop desirable habits.
3. Do not pay attention to the influence of the environment
Ignore the influence things that surround us, and rely solely on willpower is just silly. For example, if you want to make a habit to eat healthy food, get rid of delicious junk food in the fridge.
Do not just hope that you have enough motivation to take an apple instead of a donut. Just get rid of donuts and greatly increase your chances. Yes, and spoon the food into small plates, this trick also helps to eat less.
In order not to get stuck in the social networks, remove applications from the smartphone social networking, but if you want to quit smoking, try to first did not drink alcohol in the company of smokers, because the chance to break away so much increases.
Change the environment and your behavior will change.
Whatever habits you may want to start, determine what in the environment prevents you from, and what can help. And do not neglect any opportunity to help his will power some material changes.
4. To get rid of old habits, rather than to make new
Bad habits are hard enough to overcome, and much better to develop a new positive habit than to get rid of old negative.
For example, in his book, Dr. Robert Maurer told how to help a patient quit smoking. He asked her every time she feels a craving for cigarettes, to send a voice message. As a result, the woman realized what is for her the main reason for smoking, and overcome their dependence.
So you can replace your bad habits of good, for example, instead of a cigarette accustom ourselves to breathing exercises or short workouts.
5. To blame for the failure of a lack of motivation
Motivation is like a good mood - it is, then it is not. And rely on the motivation is not worth it - you will be disappointed. Of course, you can every day to cheer yourself motivational books and videos, but the day will come when nothing will help it increase.
Instead of raising the motivation, which is usually enough for a time, you need to make sure that it was not necessary. Leo Babauta says: "Take action so simple that you just could not give it up."
For example, the goal "to run one lap around the stadium," or "eat two apples a day" - you just can not come up with an excuse.
6. Do not understand the power of incentives
At the heart of every habit is the same neurological scheme - the brain reacts to a stimulus and you will automatically perform some action.
Neither one habit can not exist without the stimulus, and if you want to get rid of bad habits, you need to find and eliminate the incentives that cause them. Or rather, do not remove and replace the other incentives that will cause good habits.
For example, smoking is often a stimulus alcohol. You can replace an evening beer on cycling with a player or some interesting new hobby, which can not be combined with smoking.
7. The belief that information leads the action
Strength is not in knowledge, and in knowledge and action. The idea may not bring any benefit to itself, are the benefits of its implementation.
For example, you have read this article and decide to start gradually to change their habits. But if you still did not do that, information will be useless to you.
Read tips - try to apply them. Less rational, more emotion - let you change to become synonymous with pleasure, and the absence of changes - pain.
8. Concentration on abstract to concrete behavior instead of
Have you read a book or attended a seminar and full of motivation and energy to "start a business", "lose weight", "to make more money."
Yes, you have a good purpose, and the belief that everything will turn out, but there are no concrete, clear plans. So create them.
Do you have a desire to keep him in the head, but in the foreground have to go out specific steps that you make to your goal.
9. Seek to change behavior forever, not for a short time
Conceiving change his life and put them into practice, it is not necessary to remember the past and to think far into the future.
Concentrate on what is happening now, on what you can do today. One step after another.
The word "forever" does not provide any motivation. Fixed period of time, which can be calculated to be working much better. "For seven days, as I do not smoke," "Seven months, I walk every day in the evening," "Seven years I go for a run every morning."
You are more likely to not break their chain of days with a useful habit, "I lasted two weeks, and now give up? Well no!".
10. To think that the changes - it is difficult to
It is much easier to admit that you lack willpower, or come up with myself any other justification than to change something in their lives.
But when you have the basis for a change, for example, small good habits, you can no longer be justified.
Decide what you want to change now. Choose a good habit and start to implement it.
Make today a small step towards its implementation, consider that from the environment to help you make it easier, make and celebrate it.