hanging a habit is a tough thing to do isn’t it? We start out full of hope and positive expectation. We build our resolve, take some advice and start out with enthusiasm. But little by little it begins to fall. Until suddenly -– snap! We’re back to our old ways again. By recognizing this reality, and getting a grip on what habits are, we can prepare for building the skill of habit change.

The first thing to realize is that we are our habits. Everything we do is a habit. When we carefully watch a presenter on cable we will notice words repeated. Favorite words they use -– habitual words. We are made up of thousands of habits, some small, some big. Habits are the automatic behavior that happens without the need to think. Oops, thinking can be a habit too. Maybe we have a habit of thinking about the bad things in life! So if we want to change a habit, recognizing that we are actually changing a little bit of ourselves is a useful insight.

Next we need to understand that our habits have been around a while. So long we don’t have to think about them. True, we may notice that we’re still picking our nails, but the impulse is deep in our subconscious and overrules our thinking. Your mind is already made up before you consciously try to resist that next chocolate. Only by shifting the subconscious can we avoid the battle than follows.

Finally, we need to accept is that our habits have found a way to exist together. Similar to a group of people, they have worked out how they can all survive with each other. They may bicker but more or less they rub along together okay. They are a tightly knit community of habits that treat newcomers with suspicion. If our new habit threatens one of the existing habits – the fight is going to be bitter.

By recognizing these truths we can give our new habits a fighting chance. Rather than just throwing them in at the deep end, plan carefully. Select habits which will find it easy to survive within you before you send in the big ones. Make habit chance a life enhancing skill. For more tips on changing habits, see resources below.