Change Habit: Are your habits changing for the better?
I don’t know about you, but where ever I go, I get the same messages; for me, they’re coaching messages, and I love them.
The messages I’m referring to today are about habits, looking for tiny incremental changes in our lives, and working on those changes to produce long-lasting results.
Change Habit by 5%
Months ago, I participated in a self-defence workshop with a world-renowned expert who taught us how to escape from a position when someone has you on the ground and their total weight is on top of you. Believe me, if you haven’t been in this position, it’s not nice. You have the full weight of your opponent on your chest; it’s suffocating, painful, and claustrophobic. Typically people submit or panic in this situation, much the same as in life situations when emotional trauma hits.
Our instructor told us about the 5% benefit. If you can get a 5% benefit and turn this into an advantage, this will give you the upper edge; you turn a nearly hopeless situation into a perfect outcome. Interestingly, yesterday’s 5% advantage was a body movement so small if you blinked, you would miss it.
Small Differences
The point I’m making is that in life, it’s not the significant changes that make the difference; it’s the ones we hardly see.
How many people 25 kg overweight try to lose that 25 kg in one go? How many people with maxed-out credit cards try to pay off the balance in one go? Just about everyone? How long did it take to put on that extra 25 kgs in the first place, and how long did it take to max out the credit card? A week? A month? It took months or even years; it was a slow process. It was a gradual habit. We need to reverse or create a new habit to win at this.
I couldn’t get out of the hold the guy had on me without the 5% advantage. It was small and significant. Two years ago, I lost 25 kgs by losing 500 grams first, then another 500 grams and so on. After that, I didn’t use scales; I used my shirt, trousers and belt sizes and went from an XXXL to XL. It’s been a great feeling throwing my old clothes away.
Change Habit by 5%: Small Goals
You see, to be successful, we need to concentrate on the small goals with the view of the grand goals in the back of our minds. So for every cappuccino we forgo, that’s $4.00 we’ve saved, and for every cream bun we leave in the bakery, that’s a millimetre, we’ve reduced our waistline.
And these can be turned into habits. Small habits! The smaller, the better because small practices are easier to maintain.
So, you’re going to ask, how do I give up the big harmful habits like smoking, over-eating, drugs, gambling, etc?
Relevant Links
Check out our FREE 21 Day Video series here.
Check out this and other posts in Google here.
