How to Create Healthy Habits That Stick

Mindset by Awaecnan | 0 comments

how to create healthy habits that stick

How to Create Healthy Habits That Stick...

So you can lose weight without effort and get on with living life.

 

10-MINUTE READ

Habits, why are they so hard to break or create?

To answer that question, you need to understand how the mind works. Plus, it’s not just the habits themselves that stop us from forming new ones or breaking the ones we don’t want. It also has a lot to do with our behaviours and belief systems as well.

Let me explain first how the mind works…

How your mind works

Your mind wants to work more efficiently so it takes things that we do, think, and told repeatedly and sends them through into the part of your brain that stores your habits, behaviors, and belief systems.

record

Think of this part of your brain is like a record and all and all the grooves in the records represent your repeated tasks, thoughts, beliefs, or actions.

For example…

When you perform a task, rather than having to instruct your mind or body for every single movement that you must do for that task your brain just finds the grooves in the record and hits play.

Let’s play a game

Grab a cup of water and put it up in front of you. Your task is to pick up the cup consciously. Meaning, you must give your mind and body step-by-step instructions.

This includes all the movements in picking up a cup;

  • movement in your arms
  • closing your fingers around the cup
  • instructions the muscles to contract and flex
  • When to move what part of your arms to pick up the cup

Now if you’re going to take a sip you must instruct all the muscles in your face and consider…

  • Do you need to lean forward?
  • How do your lips need to move?
  • Do you need to swallow?
  • And don’t forget to breathe…

Could you imagine what life would be like if we had to live like this?

Rather than you having to think of every single step, your mind just goes to that groove in the record and plays that part of the record which automatically tells your mind and your body to send the signals down to pick up the cup.

If you had to think of every single thing that you did on a day-to-day basis and give your mind and body a command all through the day step-by-step it will take you all day just to get dressed.

Your mind always is looking for more efficient ways of working and so instead of clogging up your mind with endless instructions, it takes things that we do over and over and over and makes those tasks automatic habits and behaviours. Even the ones we don’t want!

Habits are just one part of the equation as to why it’s so hard for women to lose weight we also need to consider our inner child and emotional healing.

What do automatic habits look and feel like?

Now you know how habits are formed you need to know what automatic habits look and feel like so you can go about changing the ones you don’t want.

Do you remember when you were learning to drive a car?

When we first learned to drive a car, it was stressful and overwhelming. this is because we have to think of every single step and every movement (like picking up the cup above).

We had to concentrate on keeping the car in the lane and look out for other cars, pedestrians, animals, and road hazards. We also had to watch for stop signs, traffic signs, and road conditions. We also needed to accelerate, brake, change gears and indicate while changing the direction of a vehicle without running into someone.

There were times when you never thought that you would ever be able to drive a car without feeling so stressed.

Cut forward to now, do you even remember taking off your seat belt or even putting it on the last time you got in a car.

This is what automatic habits feel like.

driving image

Imagine that every healthy habit you wanted was as automatic as driving a car…

..How easy would weight loss be?

Driving a car is a classic example of how your mind works more efficiently and how automatic habits work.

  • What other habits in your day are automatic?
  • How do you wash in the shower each day?
  • How do you dry yourself when you get out?
  • Do you drive to work but don’t remember doing the driving?
  • What else are you doing without even thinking about it?

 But there’s more…

 It’s not only about habits like driving a car, washing, making a cup of tea or getting dressed that become automatic habits, it’s also…

  • what we think
  • our emotional responses
  • our behaviours
  • our habits around food
  • what foods we choose
  • and how we eat
  • how we respond to stress and

It’s all the things we taught our brains over the years that we now do without even thinking.

You will have patterns and behaviours that you do over and over and over and over that it’s contributing weight gain or further your weight not changing you’ve no idea that you’re doing it.

 Therefore ….

 When you want to change your unhealthy habits and behaviours to something healthier the mind wants to fight the change, it wants to automatically go to that part in the record and play the groove in the record for that habit.

 

Let me explain Futher…

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Let’s look at your breakfast habit, you probably eat on average the same breakfast every day and eat the same breakfast today that you ate when you were a child or a variation of the same thing that you ate as a child

Think about how old you are now and how long you’ve been eating your flavour of breakfast. How ingrained or how deep will the groove be in the record?

It will be a very deep and strong habit to break, and it will be very hard to change that habit and make it permanent without the help of hypnosis and/or NLP. Not impossible, just really really hard.

How to make habits change fast and easy

Hypnosis helps change the groove in the record and create new automatic habits, with new healthy grooves. You don’t have to go through that whole retraining phase by doing something over and over and over until it sticks, all the while the old grove never goes away. Therefore, the old record groove can come back very easy and usually in moments of high stress or when you are super busy and need your automatic record to play a lot. Sound familiar?

 

But it gets worse….

 

Imagine now having to change your lunch, dinner, snacks, emotional eating, stress eating, plus add exercise. Can you see how it gets really overwhelming fast?

 

No one has this kind of willpower…

 

Before you know if life got in the way, or your mental gymnastics was too much to continue. On average 4 days later you’re back to doing what you were doing before wondering why you can’t stick to anything.

 

The truth about habits…

 

The reason you can’t stick to change is your brain gets too overwhelmed and its goal is to work more efficiently. This trick is to make change simple, get rid of all the friction towards the change you want and work out how YOUR mind works. I.e. What are your habits, behaviours, and beliefs?

 

Remove any friction…

 

Say you want to exercise every day. Notice the thoughts that come up when you think of going for a walk.

I’ll share mine…

  1. I want to go for a walk in a park around the street is boring
  2. I need to put shoes and socks on
  3. My runners are uncomfortable
  4. It’s cold out
  5. I’ve got a drive there
  6. Is it safe?
  7. I’ve so much work to do, this will take up so much time
  8. What if I get tired or sore?
  9. What if I’m out of breath or can’t do it.

Going for a walk has become bigger than Ben Hur.

 

Instead, I now do this…

 

1. Put thongs (Aussie slang for flip flops, Jandals, sandals) on feet

2. Put on a jacket

3. Pick up keys

4. Walk outdoor

 

Pay attention to the steps. Are any of these habits’ new habits to my brain? Nope.

The only NEW habit I am creating is deciding to go for a walk.

 

I’ve removed the friction…

I made it simple…

I worked with habits I already have…

 

Let’s go back to the breakfast scenario…

 

We’re eating the same thing every single day or a variation of the same thing.

I’ll use my breakfast as an example…

I love vegemite on my toast and I’ve had vegemite on toast since I can remember and it’s one of my favourite things to eat, so why wouldn’t I want to have something that’s one of my favourite things to eat.

But for this example, imagine I want to change what I have for breakfast to something healthier.

I would do this by adding something to my routine rather than swapping it out.

 

Because…

 

1. I love vegemite toast

2. I really want to keep eating it

 

But I also want to increase my health so I add nutrition into my breakfast routine, I tried a few different things and I figured out the best one for me, a green juice.

 This fit so perfectly because…

1. I can buy already made quality cold pressed green juice

2. I get to eat vegemite toast

3. I need liquid first thing in the morning

4. I already was swapping around different liquids in the morning

5. It aligns with my values of health and vegetarianism

I have been having a green juice almost every morning for 2 years and now I crave it and yes, it’s automatic.

 

What do you think you can change or add to your day?

How can you remove the friction in what you want to change?

 

I’d love to hear your ideas. Head over to the private Facebook group and join in on the discussions.

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