I set out to read Atomic Habits in June and am sharing my takeaways with you.
Why Atomic Habits?
Table of Contents
Goal setting is something I’m passionate about. I enjoy setting targets and meeting them. However, I don’t meet every goal.
Sometimes, I procrastinate or don’t implement all steps to meet these goals. The real problem is that my habits don’t always support my goals.
When I researched goal setting, Atomic Habits was one of the most quoted resources.
In anticipation of learning more about how habits support goals, I purchased a copy of the book, which sat on my bookshelf for three years.
Enough was enough.
I went on social media and pledged to read the book and share the findings with my community. You can watch that video here.
The Atomic Habits Reading Schedule
The plan is to read 5 chapters every week in June with an update on Mondays.
Here’s the reading schedule:
Week 1 (June 2-8): Chapters 1-5
Week 2 (June 9-15): Chapters 6-10
Week 3 (June 16-22): Chapters 11-15
Week 4 (June 23-29): Chapters 16-20
Week 1 Takeaways: Atomic Habits Chapters 1-5
Chapter 1
- Strive to make minor improvements every day. Identify the actions necessary to accomplish your goal and slight improvements on one thing daily.
- Create systems. Systems help you meet goals. Identify what systems need to be in place to meet your goals and create them.
Chapter 2
- Habits are about your identity. What do you believe about yourself? Who do you want to be? How do the two identities differ?
- Habits reinforce your identity. Your identity determines your habits. It’s a loop.
Chapter 3
- Our behavior is driven by a desire to solve a problem. Our habits are our brains’ way of automating that.
- To change a behavior: make it obvious, attractive, easy, and satisfying.
Chapter 4
- To change a habit, you must first identify it.
- Clear suggests creating a Habits Scorecard to identify “bad” habits. Labeling a habit as bad will be determined by its long-term effect on meeting your goals.
- Another suggestion is Pointing and Calling. Say each action aloud along with its potential long-term effect, as this may prevent you from taking actions that don’t lead to creating the person you want to be.
Chapter 5
To create a new habit:
- Have an implementation intention. Be specific about the action you will take, where it will be done, and where.
- Stack habits. Pair a new habit with an existing one. Choose a frequency common to both habits and a time when you have a higher chance of success.
Week 2 Takeaways: Atomic Habits Chapters 6-10
Chapter 6
- The most persistent habits have multiple cues.
- Change your environment, change your habits. Habits can be easier to change in a new environment.
- Redesign your space to remove cues for bad habits and create triggers for positive habits.
Chapter 7
- Habits may be broken, but they’re not forgotten. Returning to the environment may cue a bad habit.
- The secret to self-control is a more disciplined environment. If you remove cues to ineffective habits from your environment, increases the chance of successfully breaking them.
Chapter 8
- Make new habits attractive. Higher levels of dopamine mean more motivation to complete the activity.
- Temptation bundling is a way to do this. Combine something you want to do with an action you need to do.
Chapter 9
- To build better habits, join a culture where:
a) Your desired behavior is normal, and
b) You already have something in common with the group.
Chapter 10
- Change your mindset. Instead of saying, “I have to,” say, “I get to.” By highlighting the benefits, you change the way you feel about something.
Week 3 Takeaways: Atomic Habits Chapters 11-15
Chapter 11
- The best way to build a habit is to practice it. Focus on repetition, not perfection. Habits become automatic with repetition.
Chapter 12
- Our brains are wired to conserve energy, so we gravitate toward the habits that take the least amount of effort.
- To form good habits, reduce the amount of friction (level of effort) it takes to do the action. To break a bad habit, increase the level of friction.
Chapter 13
- Habits are automatic choices that influence future actions and results.
- Identify your “decisive moments”. These are small actions that determine how you spend the next chunk of time.
- Make your habits easy to start by breaking it down to the first two minutes.
- Create “gateway habits”, that is, rituals that segue into a bigger habit.
Chapter 14
- Use a commitment device to lock in future good behavior. This makes a bad habit more difficult and a good habit almost inevitable.
- Examples of a commitment device are making goals public, or automatic savings.
Chapter 15
- We’re more likely to repeat a behavior when the experience is satisfying.
- Behavior that is obvious, attractive, and easy increases the likelihood that the habit will be done this time.
- Satisfying behavior increases the likelihood that the habit will be done next time.
- The Cardinal Rule of Behavior Change is this: Behavior that is immediately rewarded is repeated. Behavior that is immediately punished is avoided.
Week 4 Takeaways: Atomic Habits Chapters 16-20
Chapter 16
- Track your habits. This is a simple way to make a behavior obvious, attractive, and satisfying.
- Focus on the behavior, not the measurement of it.
- Don’t break the habit chain.
- If you miss one day, don’t miss two in a row.
Chapter 17
- We are more likely to avoid painful experiences. To break a bad habit, assign an immediate punishment.
- Create a habit contract stating your commitment to your habits and the punishment if you break it. Then, get an accountability partner or two to hold you to it.
- Accountability partners can help reinforce positive behaviors, as we don’t want to let people down or lose face in front of them.
Chapter 18
- The secret to maximizing your odds of success is to determine where you naturally excel.
- Habits are more likely to be satisfying when they align with your natural abilities.
- Focus on your strengths and choose habits that reinforce them.
Chapter 19
- Boredom is the greatest threat to success. As habits become more routine, you’re more likely to quit in pursuit of something new.
- Employ the Goldilocks Rule. Keep working on tasks at the edge of your abilities: not too easy or hard.
- Once a habit is established, strive to make small improvements over time. This will keep you engaged and committed.
Chapter 20
- Once a habit is established, the task becomes mindless, and thus reduced in effectiveness. The key is to introduce a layer of deliberate practice.
- Habits + Deliberate Practice = Mastery
- Review and reflect habits periodically to:
a) Identify areas for improvement, and
b) determine if your habits are still serving you. - Be careful how you cling to your identity as it becomes difficult to grow beyond it. Be flexible and fluid, so you can adapt if your environment changes.
Overall Takeaways from Atomic Habits
To create a habit, you must make it:
- Obvious
- Easy
- Attractive
- Satisfying
Atomic Habits offers a systematic process to create habits to accomplish your goals.
Have you read Atomic Habits? What were your takeaways?