Atomic Habits by James Clear
THE FUNDAMENTAL
Why Tiny Changes Make a Big Difference
1. The Surprising Power Of Atomic Habits
“the aggregation of marginal gains” : philosophy of searching for a tiny margin improvement in everything you do.
The whole principle came from the idea that if you broke down everything you could think of that goes into riding a bike, and then improve it by 1 percent, you will get a significant increase when you put them all together.
WHY SMALL HABITS MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE
It is so easy to overestimate the importance of one defining moment and underestimate the value of making small improvements on a daily basis.
Too often, we convince ourselves that massive success requires massive action. Whether it is losing weight, building a business, writing a book, winning a championship, or achieving any other goal, we put pressure on ourselves to make some earth-shattering improvement that everyone will talk about.
Success is the product of daily habits—not once-in-a-lifetime transformations.
Improving by 1 percent isn’t particularly notable – sometimes it isn’t even noticeable – but it can be far more meaningful, especially in the long run.
If you can get 1 percent better each day for one year, you’ll end up thirty – seven times better by the time you’re done. Conversely, if you get 1 percent worse each day for one year, you’ll decline nearly down to zero.
Habits are the compound interest of self – improvement. The effects of your habits multiply as you repeat them.
They seem to make little difference on any given day and yet the impact they deliver over the months and years can be enormous.
But when we repeat 1 percent errors, day after day, by replicating poor decisions, duplicating tiny mistakes, and rationalizing little excuses, our small choices compound into toxic results. It’s the accumulation of many missteps – a 1 percent decline here and there – that eventually leads to a problem.
A slight change in your daily habits can guide your life to a very different destination. Making a choice that is 1 percent better or 1 percent worse seems insignificant in the moment, but over the span of moments that make up a lifetime these choices determine the difference between who you are and who you could be. Success is the product of daily habits—not once-in-a-lifetime transformations.
If you want to predict where you’ll end up in life, all you have to do is follow the curve of tiny gains or tiny losses, and see how your daily choices will compound ten or twenty years down the line.
Time magnifies the margin between success and failure. It will multiply whatever you feed it. Good habits make time your ally. Bad habits make time your enemy.
WHAT PROGRESS IS REALLY LIKE
Breakthrough moments are often the result of many previous actions, which build up the potential required to unleash a major change. This pattern shows up everywhere. (Ice cube melting in room, example)
Plateau of Latent Potential: In order to make a meaningful difference, habits need to persist long enough to break through this plateau.
If you find yourself struggling to build a good habit or break a bad one, it is not because you have lost your ability to improve. It is often because you have not ye crossed the Plateau of Latent Potential.
Mastery requires patience.
We often expect progress to be linear. At the very least, we hope it will come quickly. In reality, the results of our efforts are often delayed. It is not until months or years later that we realize the true value of the previous work we have done. This can result in a “valley of disappointment” where people feel discouraged after putting in weeks or months of hard work without experiencing any results. However, this work was not wasted. It was simply being stored. It is not until much later that the full value of previous efforts is revealed.
All big things come from small beginnings. The seed of every habit is a single, tiny decision. But as that decision is repeated, a habit sprouts and grows stronger. Root entrench themselves and branches grow.
The task of breaking a bad habit is like uprooting a powerful oak within us. And the task of building a good habit is like cultivating a delicate flower one day at a time.
FORGET ABOUT GOALS, FOCUS ON SYSTEMS INSTEAD
Goals are about the results you want to achieve. Systems are about the processes that lead to those results.
If you want better results, then forget about setting goals. Focus on your system instead.
Goals are good for setting a direction, but systems are best for making progress. A handful of problems arise when you spend too much time thinking about your goals and not enough time designing your systems.
We think we need to change our results, but the results are not the problem. What we really need to change are the systems that cause those results.
When you solve problems at the results level, you only solve them temporarily. In order to improve for good, you need to solve problems at the systems level. Fix the inputs and the outputs will fix themselves.
True long – term thinking is goal-less thinking. It’s not about any single accomplishment. It is about the cycle of endless refinement and continuous improvement. Ultimately, it is your commitment to the process that will determine your progress.
A SYSTEM OF ATOMIC HABITS
If you’re having trouble changing your habits, the problem isn’t you. The problem is your system. Bad habits repeat themselves again and again not because you don’t want to change, but because you have the wrong system for change.
Just as atoms are the building blocks of molecules, atomic habits are the building blocks of remarkable results.
§ Small changes often appear to make no difference until you cross a critical threshold. The most powerful outcomes of any compounding process are delayed. You need to be patient.
§ An atomic habit is a little habit that is part of a larger system. Just as atoms are the building blocks of molecules, atomic habits are the building blocks of remarkable results.
§ If you want better results, then forget about setting goals. Focus on your system instead.
;;;
j 2. How Your Habits Shape Your Identity (and Vice Versa)
WHY IS IT so easy to repeat bad habits and so hard to form good ones?
Changing our habits is challenging for two reasons: (1) we try to change the wrong thing and (2) we try to change our habits in the wrong way.
There are three levels at which change can occur.
The first layer is changing your outcomes. This level is concerned with changing your results:
- losing weight
- publishing book
- winning a championship
Most of the goals you set are associated with this level of change.
The second layer is changing your process. This level is concerned with changing your habits and systems:
- Implementing a new routine at the gym
- decluttering your desk for better workflow.
- developing a meditation practice
Most of the habits you build are associated with this level.
The third and deepest layer is changing your identity. This level is concerned with changing your beliefs:
- your worldview,
- your self-image
- your judgements about yourself and others.
Most of the beliefs, assumptions, and biases you hold are associated with this level.
Outcomes are about what you get. Processes are about what you do. Identity is about what you believe.
Many people begin the process of changing their habits by focusing on what they want to achieve. This leads us to outcome-based habits. The alternative is to build identity-based habits. With this approach, we start by focusing on who we wish to become.
With outcome-based habits, the focus is on what you want to achieve. With identity-based habits, the focus is on who you wish to become.
Imagine two people resisting a cigarette. When offered a smoke, the first person says, “No thanks. I’m trying to quit.” It sounds like a reasonable response, but this person still believes they are a smoker who is trying to be something else. They are hoping their behavior will change while carrying around the same beliefs.
The second person declines by saying, “No thanks. I’m not a smoker.” It’s a small difference, but this statement signals a shift in identity. Smoking was part of their former life, not their current one. They no longer identify as someone who smokes.
It’s hard to change your habits if you never change the underlying beliefs that led to your past behavior.
- You want more money, but your identity is who consumes rather than creates
- You may want better health, but if you continue to prioritize comfort over accomplishment, you’ll be drawn to relaxing rather than training.
The ultimate form of intrinsic motivation is when a habit becomes part of your identity.
It’s one thing to say I’m the type of person who wants this. It’s something very different to say I’m the type of person who is this.
The more pride you have in a particular aspect of your identity, the more motivated you will be to maintain the habits associated with it. If you’re proud of how your hair looks, you’ll develop all sorts of habits to care for and maintain it. If you’re proud of the size of your biceps, you’ll make sure you never skip an upper-body workout. Once your pride gets involved, you’ll fight tooth and nail to maintain your habits.
True behavior change is identity change.
Improvements are only temporary until they become part of who you are.
The goal is not to read a book, the goal is to become a reader.
The goal is not to run a marathon, the goal is to become a runner.
The goal is not to learn instrument, the goal is to become a musician.
Your behaviors are usually a reflection of your identity. What you do is an indication of the type of person you believe that you are—either consciously or Non consciously.
Research has shown that once a person believes in a particular aspect of their identity, they are more likely to act in alignment with that belief.
After all, when your behavior and your identity are fully aligned, you are no longer pursuing behavior change. You are simply acting like the type of person you already believe yourself to be.
The more deeply a thought or action is tied to your identity, the more difficult it is to change it.
Over the long run, however, the real reason you fail to stick with habits is that your self-image gets in the way. This is why you can’t get too attached to one version of your identity.
Progress requires unlearning.
Becoming the best version of yourself requires you to continuously edit your beliefs, and to upgrade and expand your identity.
THE TWO-STEP PROCESS TO CHANGING YOUR IDENTITY
Your identity emerges out of your habits.
More precisely, your habits are how you embody your identity. When you make your bed each day, you embody the identity of an organized person. When you write each day, you embody the identity of a creative person. When you train each day, you embody the identity of an athletic person.
The more you repeat a behavior, the more you reinforce the identity associated with that behavior.
Identity = essentitas = being, identidem = repeatedly
Your identity is literally your “repeated beingness.”
The process of building habits is actually the process of becoming yourself.
This is a gradual evolution. We do not change by snapping our fingers and deciding to be someone entirely new. We change bit by bit, day by day, habit by habit. We are continually undergoing microevolutions of the self.
Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. No single instance will transform your beliefs, but as the votes build up, so does the evidence of your new identity. This is one reason why meaningful change does not require radical change. Small habits can make a meaningful difference by providing evidence of a new identity. And if a change is meaningful, it actually is big. That’s the paradox of making small improvements.
Each habit not only gets results but also teaches you something far more important: to trust yourself.
It is a simple two-step process:
Decide the type of person you want to be.
Prove it to yourself with small wins.
For example, “Who is the type of person who could write a book?” It’s probably someone who is consistent and reliable. Now your focus shifts from writing a book (outcome-based) to being the type of person who is consistent and reliable (identity-based).
Once you have a handle on the type of person you want to be, you can begin taking small steps to reinforce your desired identity.
The focus should always be on becoming that type of person, not getting a particular outcome.
THE REAL REASON HABITS MATTER
But the true question is: “Are you becoming the type of person you want to become?” The first step is not what or how, but who. You need to know who you want to be. Otherwise, your quest for change is like a boat without a rudder.
Ultimately, your habits matter because they help you become the type of person you wish to be. They are the channel through which you develop your deepest beliefs about yourself. Quite literally, you become your habits.
Chapter Summary:
■ There are three levels of change: outcome change, process change, and identity change.
■ The most effective way to change your habits is to focus not on what you want to achieve, but on who you wish to become.
■ Your identity emerges out of your habits. Every action is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.
■ Becoming the best version of yourself requires you to continuously edit your beliefs, and to upgrade and expand your identity.
■ The real reason habits matter is not because they can get you better results (although they can do that), but because they can change your beliefs about yourself.
Comments
Post a Comment