As humans, we’re creatures of habit and routine. But while some habits are good for us, others can negatively impact our mental and physical health.
There’s never a bad time to work on developing positive habits or to try breaking some old ones. But it’s worth keeping in mind that altering your behaviour isn’t something that happens overnight – it will likely take time and determination.
The good news is that the journey to breaking negative habits and developing positive ones is often enjoyable.
Watching your life becoming steadily better as a result of the time and effort that you’re putting into working on yourself can be very satisfying. And once you start reaping the benefits, you might feel compelled to make positive changes in other areas of your life too.
Unhelpful habits that you want to change or quit could be anything from smoking or drinking, to spending too much time on your smartphone. While habits you might want to adopt could include things like doing regular exercise, reading more, or getting up earlier in the morning.
Often, leaving a negative habit behind and forming a positive one go hand in hand, as breaking a negative habit is often much easier if we have a positive one to replace it with.
If you’re looking to make 2024 a time of personal growth and change, then read on to find out more about how to break unhelpful habits and form positive ones.
What are habits and how are they formed?
A habit is a behaviour that we repeat regularly or routinely and have ‘settled into’ – so much so that we usually do it subconsciously.
Many habits are formed early on in life, such as brushing our teeth before bed, or eating dinner in the evening – while others might develop in response to different situations. Often, these habits can stick with us even after the situation has passed.
For example, we might develop a drinking habit during a particularly stressful time, but continue drinking even after the original cause of the stress has been resolved. Or, as we saw during the COVID-19 lockdown, many gym-goers got into the habit of running outside or doing home workouts while gyms were closed, but stuck to doing these things even once gyms reopened.
Experts say that habits are formed during a three-part psychological loop, which begins with a trigger (for example, feeling anxious) that prompts us to act (usually something we feel will relieve that anxiety), and leads to a reward (feeling less anxious).
It’s this reward factor that leads us to continue repeating a behaviour. If we repeat this action enough, it’ll become a habit, which means that our brains will work out how to carry out this action in ‘autopilot mode’. This means we become more efficient at reaching the reward.
We’ll then typically find ourselves carrying out the action with little or no conscious thought – this is when we know that it’s become a habit.
How long does a habit take to form?
The length of time a habit takes to form will often depend on its complexity. For instance, it’ll take less time for the action of putting your seatbelt on when you get in the car to become routine than something like getting up an hour earlier – as, to start with, getting up earlier will require additional determination and willpower.
This study suggests that it takes 18 to 254 days for a person to form a habit.
This means that the best way to go about forming a habit is to keep at it until you realise that you no longer have to force yourself to go for a run, or to put your phone down without endlessly scrolling first.
Often, you won’t even notice that a behaviour has become a habit because habits are formed very gradually.
8 tips on how to break negative habits and develop positive ones
1. Identify unhelpful habits and work out what your triggers are
The first step in changing unhealthy or unhelpful behaviour is to identify and acknowledge it. Then work out what triggers it in the first place. It can sometimes be difficult to admit to yourself that a behaviour you repeat regularly is damaging your health, preventing you from moving forward, or getting in the way of you enjoying life.
It can also be uncomfortable to reflect on what triggers the habit in the first place, as this can sometimes show us that there are larger issues in our lives that need addressing. However, once you identify your triggers, you can start taking steps toward removing them from your life and developing new, healthier habits.
For instance, if you realise that you have an online shopping habit, brought on by stress and anxiety, the next step would be to start looking at how you can reduce these feelings, so that you don’t feel the need to online shop to feel better. You could also consider what you could do instead of shopping to manage any feelings of stress and anxiety if they do arise.
When you’re considering which behaviours you’d like to change, it can be helpful to write them down. This can offer some clarity on what your triggers are. To do so, you could try journaling or even creating a vision board.
2. Consider which positive habit(s) you want to adopt
Not everyone who’s looking to form a new habit is wanting to replace an unhealthy one. It’s possible that you could also just be looking to try something new or boost your wellbeing.
You might feel that incorporating some mindfulness or meditation into your routine could help you feel calmer and more connected to life. Or, maybe you used to enjoy reading and would like to get back into the habit of reading daily.
If you’re looking to break a negative habit then it’s often much easier to replace this habit, than to concentrate solely on eradicating it from your routine. Breaking a habit can require a lot of conscious effort, so having a positive alternative that you can turn to instead can be a real help.
For example, a person might find that they turn to sugary or fatty foods when they’re feeling low because this offers them comfort and distraction. Instead, when they feel low it might be worth getting into the habit of writing their feelings in a journal, going out for a walk, or listening to some music to relax and unwind instead. It’s much easier to fall back into a negative habit without a positive alternative to turn to instead.
Try noting down a few behaviours that you could use as an alternative to whatever unhealthy behaviour you’re trying to avoid. When replacing a negative habit, it can sometimes take a bit of trial and error to find something positive that sticks, but once you do, it’ll be much easier to turn it into a habit.
3. Cut out as many triggers as possible
If you’re trying to break an unhelpful habit, it can also help to work on cutting out as many triggers for the negative habit out of your life as possible.
For example, if you’re looking to break your coffee habit, but are struggling because you’re exhausted by an overwhelming work schedule, then perhaps it’s time to look at whether you’re taking on too many hours at work and not getting enough rest.
Or, if you find yourself feeling anxious and biting your nails every time you scroll through the news on your phone, then maybe it’s time to limit the amount of news you expose yourself to each day, to reduce your anxiety levels.
Often, negative habits can be key indicators of larger issues in our lives. Tackling these can help to boost our happiness and wellbeing in the long term, and avoid developing new unhealthy habits.
4. Start by setting yourself manageable, realistic goals
When we decide that we want to change our lives for the better, this can leave us feeling hopeful and optimistic about the future. This optimism, although positive, can sometimes lead to us trying to tackle all of our goals at once to get results as quickly as possible.
While this isn’t always a bad thing, it can sometimes leave us feeling as though we’re standing at the bottom of a mountain, wondering how to start climbing. This feeling can be overwhelming and might result in us either deciding to stay at the bottom of the mountain, or begin climbing only to slip and stay wherever we land.
To make sure that we’re able to continue climbing and working towards forming new, positive habits – or quitting unhelpful ones – it can help to take things at a pace that feels manageable and sustainable.
For example, if you’re looking to read more but find it hard to stay focused on a book for long periods, then committing to a 900-page novel might not be the best place to start.
Instead, you could try starting with a 200-page novel on a topic that interests you. This will help to keep you engaged and won’t leave you feeling overwhelmed. It can also help to try reading two or three pages a day to start with, rather than telling yourself that you need to finish an entire book within a few days or a week. Chances are, it won’t be long before you naturally feel yourself wanting to read more than just a couple of pages at a time.
Or, if you’re looking to make exercise a habit, but it’s something that you feel you have to motivate yourself to do, then consider starting by doing 10 minutes a day and building it up slowly. This way, you’re less likely to experience burnout and are more likely to create a sustainable, long-term habit.
5. Surround yourself with like-minded people who are striving for similar goals, or living in a way similar to how you’d like to live
It can be much easier to stick to a new habit or quit unhealthy ones if we surround ourselves with like-minded people who share similar behaviours.
For instance, if you’re looking to be more active, then surrounding yourself with people with similar fitness goals and interests can help you to stay on track, and make repeating these behaviours easier. You could even buddy up with a friend or family member, and commit to motivating one another to exercise on certain days every week.
Similarly, if you’re looking to stop a behaviour, such as smoking, then spending a lot of time with someone who smokes can make kicking your habit more of a challenge – as everytime they light up a cigarette, you might feel tempted to do the same.
While it’s not always possible to avoid people who have habits that you’re trying to give up, it can sometimes help to let them know what your own goals are, so that they can avoid doing anything that might trigger you – like offering you a cigarette or smoking around you.
6. Remind yourself that habits are learned behaviours, which can be changed at any time
It’s easy to see breaking a negative habit or developing a new, positive habit as a journey to becoming a new person entirely. This can sometimes add pressure to the process, which can hinder your progress.
The reality is that you already have it in you to be someone with the positive habits you want to develop, or someone without the unhelpful habits you want to drop.
For example, if you’re trying to give up smoking, then it’s a case of returning to being a non-smoker (which you’ll have been at some point in your life). While this is often easier said than done, it can be comforting to remind yourself that you know you can live without certain behaviours, because you’ve done so in the past.
When it comes to forming new, helpful habits, it can be useful to view the process as simply expanding or adding to all the positive habits that you already have – no matter how large or small these are.
For instance, perhaps you find cooking healthy meals from scratch a bit of a chore but are keen to turn it into a habit. So, rather than thinking that you need to become a new person to be able to achieve this, try to look at all the other positive habits you already engage in daily or weekly.
Perhaps, you’re great at getting up early and getting moving in the morning, or maybe come rain or shine, you’re out twice a day with your dog, making sure they get the exercise they need. Your current positive habits can hopefully help you to realise that you’re capable of developing a whole host of other positive habits too, without completely changing who you are.
7. Visualise yourself succeeding and be kind to yourself if you hit a few bumps along the way
One of the things that often puts us off breaking negative habits or forming new ones is convincing ourselves that we can’t do it. Then, if we have a setback, we beat ourselves up and worry that our hard work has all gone out the window.
These thought processes can cause us to become demotivated and steer away from positive habits, or continue engaging in old, negative habits because we lose self-belief and start doubting our abilities.
However, spending a few minutes each day visualising yourself succeeding can be very powerful, because it increases confidence and helps us to believe in a positive future outcome. The more we believe in ourselves and our ability to achieve what we set out to, the more likely we are to put the work in and keep repeating that work until we get to where we want to be.
8. Repeat, repeat, repeat
The only way to form a new habit or replace an old one is to keep repeating the action that you want to become a habit.
It’s not uncommon for people to become disheartened if they feel they’re still having to put conscious effort into the action after some time has passed, and to assume that the process isn’t working. But, often, a habit is formed very steadily and we might not notice it’s even happening at first, so it’s important to keep at it.
It can also take time to completely let go of negative habits, even when replacing them with positive ones. You might find yourself having moments of weakness, where you feel tempted to return to your habit, and you might even give in to this temptation at times.
If this happens, try to accept what’s happened and move on, while continuing to practise your new, positive habit. Changing old habits is entirely possible, as long as you don’t give up.
Final thoughts…
Having habits makes us human, and we all have them – both good and bad. However, it can be helpful to look at areas of our lives where our unhelpful or unhealthy habits are keeping us from reaching our full potential and getting the most out of life. Or, where developing additional, positive habits, could enrich our lives, and improve our health and wellbeing.
Developing new positive habits is especially important during the more difficult and stressful times in our lives. Because habits are behaviours that are repeated so regularly that they become unconscious, they have the potential to have a significant impact on how we feel day to day – whether we’re inherently aware of the impact that they’re having on us or not. So, thinking about the different ways that we can make these habits as positive as possible can only be a good thing.
For further reading, check out the healthy mind section of our website.
Are you going through the process of breaking an unhelpful habit or forming a new one? What has your experience been like so far? What habits are you looking to change? We’d be interested to hear from you in the comments below.