Stop Building Good Habits
Brian Ford
Using personal development to fundraise for charity | Self-Improvement Podcaster (20+ million downloads) | Social Impact Leader (Nonprofit founder at For Purpose Foundation)
In personal development people have an obsession with building good habits - to get into the gym consistently, to practice portion control, to get up first thing in the morning without hitting the snooze button, to meditate in the morning, to get some movement in throughout the day, this list goes on and on.
And for good reason. Having good habits is arguably the best thing you can do to live a happier, healthier, more impactful life. If actions create results, then consistent good actions will generate the results you want in life.
But as good as having good habits are, don’t waste your time building them. You should build good systems instead, and the habits come as a natural byproduct.
When most people think of habits they think of being disciplined, of doing what you said you were going to do even when you don’t feel like it. But that’s an uphill battle of relying on willpower to make yourself do the things you’re telling yourself you need to do.?
It doesn’t need to be that hard. In fact, by definition habits are meant to be automatic, unconscious, and habitual. They’re supposed to be effortless. What’s way more effective and sustainable is to put your time and energy into building systems where the natural output of the system is the desired behavior.
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The reason systems breed true consistency is because they are part of the environment. Good systems change the path of least resistance in a positive way, making positive action automatic.
This is the difference: Imagine you’re in a canoe on a river. Without any effort, you will float wherever the river is headed. That’s the environment. If you want to go somewhere else, if downstream is not desirable, then you need to paddle and change course. This is using will-power. Building a system is like digging a moat or putting up a dam that changes the direction of the current, so that it naturally pulls you where you want to go.
The biggest opportunity for you to be more consistent in your life, and actually have good habits, is to update the systems in your life.
If you don’t know how to do that, but you know that your inconsistency is holding you back from reaching your fullest potential - it's time you become a consistency, productivity, high-performance, change-making machine. All you have to do is start 2025 by doing this!