Healthier Habits Made Simple – Checklist
The place that your health is in right now can be attributed to the sum of your habits. If you want to change them to better your health it’s going to take some deep understanding and more important action. The following checklist can be used a guide to help you on your way:
1.Keep a log of your daily behaviours for a week or two so that you can source where your potential triggers are coming from.
2.Once you spot a trend, record where you are, who you are with, what you just did, the time it was and the likely emotion you were feeling. After a few weeks see which cue stands out. This is most likely what is triggering you to do a habit.
3.To change a bad habit, consider can you choose a better alternative, increase the friction so that it makes it harder for you to do, avoid it completely by changing your environment or by building accountability.
4.To build a good habit, make it easy, make it attractive to do, reward yourself for doing it or join a culture that is already doing the habit you want to do more of.
5.Before picking where to start, clarify the exact goal such as “I want to lose 10 pounds” or “walk 5,000 steps a day”.
6.List all the potential behaviours that you think could work toward your goal.
7.Keep the behaviours that you think can realistically work for you right now considering your current abilities and commitment. Get rid of the ones that don’t “match” very well for you right now.
8.Pick a prompt that is likely to remind you to do your new habit. Think, alarms, post it notes or add it to a behaviour you already do.
9.Track your progress each day using a habit tracker, digital or physical can both work. If you notice you’re not doing them consistently, make them easier to do until the consistency improves.
10. Accept that habits take time to form and you will have to patience. Keep putting your reps. Every one you do moves you closer to making a new behaviour last.....
