Building a Habit

As mentioned in my previous post, one of the key things that I wanted to do in 2015, was to build a daily writing habit. But I didn’t do too well due to reasons already mentioned in the last post. The good news is that I have written pretty regularly in the last two weeks, using what I learnt from a wonderful book - The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. It shares insights about how and why habits form, how they can be changed, and the science behind it. 

The biggest lesson that the book taught me was that “willpower is a finite resource.” As long as I relied only on my willpower to push myself into writing everyday, I was going to exhaust this resource and give up sooner or later. What I needed was to make writing a part of my routine, a habit - so that I did not have to think about or decide if and when to write. I needed it to become as automatic as brushing my teeth in the morning.

Here’s how it works, as per the book: all habits follow a simple loop (called the "habit loop,) which is made up of three components: first, there is a cue (e.g. my leaving the bed in the morning with an unpleasant taste in my mouth); then, there is a behaviour (my heading to the bathroom and brushing my teeth); and finally, there is a reward (the feeling of clean teeth and a fresh mouth.) The days when the act of brushing my teeth gets delayed, I feel unhappy because I crave that fresh feeling. This craving is what drives my habit loop of brushing every morning. I never ever have to think about whether I should brush today or not - it just happens on its own. It’s a habit.

So, for building a writing habit also, I needed these three components. Here’s what I have been doing for the past couple of weeks:

1. The Cue: Every morning, when my husband leaves for work, I see him off and then head to my desk. I love this time, because I feel a strong sense of purpose and am ready to get to work - which can range from taking courses to writing something to reading. This is a routine - something I do almost every weekday. And it occurred to me that this was a good cue - as soon as I close the door after my husband leaves for work, I can write with full concentration.

2. The Behaviour: Yes, writing, of course. But, there are too many distractions that are ready to pounce on me the moment I switch on the laptop. Facebook updates, mails, bill payment reminders, whatsapp messages...there is a lot that needs to be paid attention to. But, before I do any of this, I want to write. The solution? I put my phone on silent for half-an-hour, close all windows on the laptop, and open just one document where I can type. And then, I focus on writing.

3. The Reward: The immense satisfaction I get from doing this. The craving for this satisfaction drives this habit loop.

A couple of other things need to be mentioned here. First of all, I have brought my daily target down to 200-300 words a day (as opposed to 1000 words a day that I set at the beginning of the year.) This is much more realistic, and I have since learnt that it is important to start small when trying to build a new habit. Once I able to meet this goal for a couple of months, I will look at increasing it. Secondly, my cue is something that happens on weekdays only. So, as of now, I am targeting writing five days a week. 200-300 words every weekday - simple.

It has worked for a couple of weeks already, and I hope to keep it up.