HOW TO STOP AN HABIT

Habits are formed as a result of what we have exposed or submitted our body and mind to in the past and presence. What you do often naturally becomes your habit. We all have one habit or two we could stand to lose, but habits are hard to break. Whether your bad habit is procrastinating, overspending, swearing, or any other one you want to change, here are tips that will help you break free of negative behavior patterns.

1. Fine Yourself for Each Offense 

Make a bad habit a little more painful and you might ditch it for good. Money is a great motivator, so you can use the “swear jar” method or pay your friends each time they catch you doing that thing you want to stop doing. It works the other way too: Reward yourself for beating your habit every day.

2.Understand Your Habits

Understanding how we make decisions is the key to conquering all kinds of bad habits, including money ones.  Often, we repeat bad habits without even realize we're doing them. 

3. Go Slow and Make Tiny Changes

Forming better new habits takes time and effort, but breaking established bad habits may be even harder. So be patient with yourself and instead of making dramatic adjustments, try focusing on one habit and the smallest steps you can take to “trick your inner caveman” With food and dieting, for example, small change like reducing one pack of sugar or switch cream in your coffee to low-fat milk can make a big difference in the long run.

4. Spend a Month Thinking About Your Habit Before Taking Action

You might be itching to get rid of that habit right now, but as mentioned above, it takes time. Before you start trying to change a habit, consider thinking about it thoroughly for a month first, listing every reason you want to stop, recording every time you catch yourself doing it, and so on. You could be better prepared to conquer the habit after this preparation.

5. Change Your Environment 

Over time, if you do the same behaviors in the same place, your surroundings can become a trigger—sometimes very subtle to notice. If you go on smoke breaks in your office's parking lot, the parking lot itself can become a cue to smoke. Switch up your surrounds in even the smallest way. 

6. Coach Yourself Out of Bad Habits

You can use a webcam to break your habits, by recording why you want to break them everyday and you can effectively coach yourself to stop doing those habits. It might seems a little strange at first, but it could work for you. 

7. Do a Review When You Have a Bad Habit Relapse

Chances are you're going to have bad days. Setbacks are normal and we should expect them. Have a plan to get back on track and use the relapse as a way to understand what happened and how you can avoid it next time.

8. Create an If-Then Plan 

 Habits are loops, that we repeat automatically. A cue triggers our routine, we get the reward from it, and then repeat. An if-Then plan can help you disrupt this cue- routine- reward system and replace bad habits with good ones. Just remember to keep your plan as simple as possible. 

9. Train Yourself to Think Differently About Your Bad Habits

Even if we hate a habit we're doing, like smoking or biting our nails, we tend to continue doing them because they provide us with some sort of satisfaction or psychological reward. Catch yourself thinking any positive thoughts or feelings about your bad habits and reframe them to remind you of the negative aspects. In other words, in this case, it's good to think like a hater.

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