21 Days

What is meant by ‘bad habits’?

If you were to look in the dictionary one of the definitions of “habit” states that it is an acquired behavior pattern regularly followed until it has become almost involuntary. Acquired means you weren't born with it and you don’t have to live with it.

Here are a few examples of bad habits:

Smoking

Eating unhealthy

Nail biting

Tardiness

Cracking knuckles

Emotional eating

Bad habits are generally acquired through necessity. People need to find comfortable ways to cope with traumatic, stressful or just plain negative things that happen in life. Bad habits are behaviors learned to help deal with events, and often this is done because the individual may not know or understand how to incorporate healthier options to deal with the situations.For example, a person might eat junk food to deal with anxiety versus taking a deep breath and moving through the anxiety.

Why does a bad habit feel involuntary?

A bad habit feels involuntary because it’s been used as an automated way to cope for an extended period of time. Using the above example, when anxiety surfaces you will automatically reach for junk food. If eating junk food satisfies the need to cope, the bad habit will continue. It seems automatic, an event will happen and without much conscious thought, a bad habit will follow. 

This is how people lose their sense of control over the habit. Bad habits are not an inherited trait and you have control over whether or not you continue to use bad habits to cope.

What can I do to reverse bad habits?

You will generally change when you perceive a problem or need for change. Initially you may focus on the difficulty of change and the reasons for not changing may outweigh the reasons for changing. If the problem continues, you will start to see the positive in the reasons for change and begin a plan for that change. Change generally happens slowly. It may start through education, talking to family and friends, or doing some research on options to find alternative behaviors.

It's difficult to change what's comfortable and familiar even if it is negative. Many people may not realize (for years) that what they are doing is ‘bad’ or ‘negative’. Once realized, people begin to feel like they don't have options; they don't feel like they have any control over the bad habit.

How can I change bad habits?

Bad habits are reversible and one way of reversing them starts with understanding the root cause. For example, If eating junk food is your bad habit think about when you started eating junk food and why you began the behavior. 

You have probably never thought about the root cause and probably had a very good reason for initially eating junk food when you felt anxious. If you want to stop eating junk food, you will have to find a better or healthier way to deal with your anxiety. 

For example, if a better way to deal with your anxiety is to take a deep breath, you will need to change that cognitive-behavior link from junk food to taking a deep breath. You will have to remind your brain (over and over) that you are going to use a deep breath rather than eating junk food when you feel anxious. This will take time. 

Here are a couple of tips to help remind your brain of the change:

Post sticky notes in high stress areas

Place the statement, “deep breath” on you computer and/or cell phone wall paper

Ask loved ones to remind you during times of anxiety to take a deep breath and focus on something positive

Seeing, hearing and putting these tips into practice over and over will then start to feel involuntary and will build a new blue print to replace the old blueprint in your brain.

How can I stick to a change of a bad habit?

The key to stick to changes is to have a sense of control over what you are doing, when you are doing it, and where. For example, maybe you have anxiety around working out which leads to eating junk food. Choose a workout you love or something you think you'll grow to love and have fun with. Add in social support such as friends, co-workers or family members to help keep yourself engaged. Similar to anything new, you need to realize that you are starting off with a sense of newness but those feelings will go away; as with anything in life that is new.

Follow that up by setting realistic goals to help stay motivated. Realistic means choosing activities within your capabilities; what can you do that will push yourself, but not so far that you fail and feel unsuccessful. As you find yourselff reaching one goal, you'll find your confidence improving and work harder to reach the next goal.

And remember.. It takes 21 days to form a habit. If you currently have a bad habit to break, it will take 21 days to replace that habit with a new one.. 21 days.. that's all it takes.