Having Success Habits – Part 1

Many have tackled the issues pertain to the title of this article before. May be the first was Napoleon Hill early in the twentieth century, in his huge book “Laws of success” that was published in 1928. It was followed in 1937 by what had become the best-selling success book “Think and Grow Rich” that I recommend all my friends, colleagues and followers to read. Many others wrote about habits, the power of habits, what habits that are shared among successful people, etc. It seems that the human nature is still the same and is not changing over decades, which encourages me to write this article trying to summarize the most important ideas of that subject.

First of all, let us differentiate between Having goals and actually pursuing goals. I remember one of the famous quotes by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry “A goal without a plan is just a wish.”. I do believe that you should have the good habits that help you to successfully purse your goals. Habits are the most powerful part of life without doubts. You should understand that successful people are creators of successful habits and successful routines. It has been scientifically proven that most people perform better when they have a routine.

For more elaboration, we all experience moments when we say to ourselves something like:

“I should lose some weight.”

“I should spend more time focusing on online course that I have started months ago.”

“I should dedicate more time to my kids and family.”

“I wish I could build stronger glutes and legs.”

“I wish I would write more.”

“I wish if I spend less time on the social media”

Did you ever notice how much time do you spend “should-ing” or “wish-ing”? as we have all noticed, it is easy to have wishes and dreams, but following through is often more difficult. Why? We want more from our lives, our careers and our influence, but many of us fall short of their goals. The reason is not lacking of desire, but rather lack of strong will and persistence to raise our standards to create real change that lasts to be effective.

This change isn’t easy. Old habits die hard, and new habits are even harder to form, herein some tips that may help in creating some new good habits:

1.    Consistency: this is may be the first and most important advice that anyone who is keen on forming a new habit should follow. Repetition builds habits. Whether the new habit is waking up early at a specific time in the morning, learning to play the piano, reading an hour every day, going to the gym 4 times a week, or whatever, it is so important to set a time and have a routine. Be accountable, and it may be a good idea to set reminders on your smart phone, ask a trusted member of your family and/or friends to encourage you and check in on you.

2.    Have a clear goal: your goal should be very clear or as we say “SMART”, which means “Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time-bound”. You should know exactly what are you going to do, when are you going to do it, why and how you will do it, and finally the time frame for reaching your objective. If there is any ambiguity on any of these questions, most likely won’t do it. Monitoring your progress is essential, and it is something different from judging yourself which may be a little bit frustrating. It is always good to re-adjust your plan to get back on track quickly if you mess up. Be kind to yourself and remember it is not an easy thing to get rid of a bad habit and acquire a new good one.

3.    Start small: We can’t change or fix all things overnight. It is always easier to begin with small and easy to form habits. For instance, you can decide walking 15 minutes a day as a start for the hour that you aspire to. Put a cap of 30 minutes for the social media a day and/or stop their notifications totally during the day you used to spend with your family just to eliminate the temptation. To stay informed, simply you can check news updates on your computer or TV at the time suitable for you without mindless scrolling on your phone taking over.

4.    Adjust your attitude: Changing your mindset begins with your attitude. Change occurs the moment you stop hoping for it and start working for it. You must start taking real steps to make change happen. Saying I should build more muscles and increase my fitness would never get you the shape and fitness that you would like to have. Stop blaming others for your lack of progress and take full responsibility for figuring out what is not working and fix it. For instance, instead of saying “I should figure out why my boss do not pay much attention to my ideas”, you can say “I must figure out what I lack in communication skills”. Do you notice the difference? Attitude changes action  

5.    It’s a marathon, not a sprint: you must have the marathon runner mentality when trying to acquire a new habit. We’ve long been led to believe that new habits form in 21 days. Actually, this is not true. Modern behavior psychology studies say it takes at least 40 days for the habit to be formed. Some other studies say 66 days for the habits to become wired into behavior. Regardless of the exact number of days that may vary due to several circumstances and/or from one person to another, the reality is habits form from consistence execution of the same action. So, commit with yourself to repeated practice if you are serious. 

My last recommendation is commitment. Commit to change by showing up and doing the hard work each day. Commit to raise your standards and expect more from yourself. Commit to change your attitude as knowledge and skills alone are not enough. Commit to raise your bar. Our habits are either helping us to move forward or are the main hindrances to our development.

Part 2 of this article, https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/having-success-habits-part-2-tarek-soliman/ will present some of the good habits that everyone should try acquiring. Habits that have been acquired by successful people and become part of their daily and weekly routines.