Notes on Atomic Habits

This week, I picked up Atomic Habits By James Clear, I had this book on my reading list for a long time, and I have had this book recommended to me by almost every “Self Help” youtuber and some of my peers, so I felt it was about time that I slash it from reading list.

The Fundamentals: Why tiny changes make big differences

James Clear, starts off by recalling an event that changed the course of life for him; He was hit by a baseball bat that was mistakenly swung by one of the players and hit Clear right between his eyes, the impact was with such force that it not only broke his nose but also gave him brain damage. Clear then goes on to say how he didn’t give up and used a series of principals to win at life once again, Atomic habits

Small habits make a big difference - You might not notice it but becoming just 1% better everyday, will lead you to become 37 times better than your past self at the end of year; conversly, becoming 1% worse will lead you to decline to 0. We call these marginal gains Atomic habits

Your Habits Compound - Every time you read a new book, you might not feel that you are becoming more “knowledgable”, but that 1% knowledge will compund until one day you have an “eureka” moment and realize that seemingly overnight you have come a long way from what you used to be.

The plateu of latent potential - When learning anything new you might expect a linear graph, but that is not true, at the start, you will feel motivated to learn, but as you do the activity more, you will feel as if you aren’t getting any better, this is where your motivation will dip, called the Valley of disappointment if you are able to overcome this initial stage, you will then be able to rise once again

Devise systems not goals - Often while setting goals, you end up making them either too unrealistic, even if you achive a goal, you will face a yo-yo effect, when your entire motivation to get better was that specific goal, once it is achived you will no longer feel obliged to keep doing that activity, thus resorting to your previous self.

If you’re an entrepreneur, your goal might be to build a million-dollar business. Your system is how you test product ideas, hire employees, and run marketing campaigns.

Let your habits shape your identity and your identity shape your habits - To change a habit we must first change our outcome; Decide upon a goal; Then we must devise a system to achive that goal; Then, we should change our identity to incorporte that habit. Start associating everything you do, with your identity “I am a writer” everytime you write, and prove that to yourself by writing more.

Building better habits

Habits are nothing but reliable answers to repeated outcomes that our brain devises to remove the overhead. The process of carrying our a habit is comprised of two steps –

Cue -> Craving -> Response -> Reward

To build a successful habit, we must make use of these four stages such that

Cue is Obvious -> Craving is Attractive -> Response is easy -> Reward is Satisfying

1st Law - Make (the cue) it obvious

To start a new habit we must make it as explicit as possible, put your habits in this template I will [BEHAVIOR] at [TIME] in [LOCATION].

It is hard to form new habits or to decide upon the exact time and place to carry them out, this is why you should use Habit Stacking essentially make the reward of your existing habit a cue of the new one. After I get the [REWARD] from [HABIT] I will [NEW HABIT] This makes it so your habits are inter-linked, giving you an easier way forward

Make your cues visible in the environment, sprinkle triggers and cues that spark a habit throughout your house; For instance

Trying to eat healthier? It is likely that you shop on autopilot at your regular supermarket. Try a new grocery store. You may find it easier to avoid unhealthy food when your brain doesn’t automatically know where it is located in the store

2nd Law - Make (the craving) it attractive

To carry out an action you must crave the reward; This is easy when the action is easy and the reward is good, take Binging Netflix as an example, the craving is the entertainment you will get, the action is easy – just turn the tv on.

To do hard things make use of Temptation Bundling, make the motivation to carry out a habit (Say Exercising) another “easier” habit (Say watching netflix), your craving to watch netflix will prompt your brain to get done with the first habit.

Surround yourself with people who aprove and appreciate your habit, this in itself will be a motivation to get the hard things done.

3rd Law - Make (the action) it easy

Habits are formed by repetetion, the more you do an activity the closer will you get to forming it into a habit.

Make it so that your habit isn’t hard, to do this, you must take efforts to make the habit easy.

Want to draw more? Put your pencils, pens, notebooks, and drawing tools on top of your desk, within easy reach.

Instead of setting Unrealistic goals, set an explicit and doable intensity, Instead of saying “You want to read a book at night” say “You will read a page of book every night”, this will make the habit easier, thus more appealing for your brain to carry out, use this as a “Gateway habit” to delve deeper into the action you are trying to do. The hardest part is just starting it. Example of shaping a habit, one step at a time

Phase 1: Be home by 10 p.m. every night.
Phase 2: Have all devices (TV, phone, etc.) turned off by 10 p.m. every night.
Phase 3: Be in bed by 10 p.m. every night (reading a book, talking with your partner).
Phase 4: Lights off by 10 p.m. every night.
Phase 5: Wake up at 6 a.m. every day.

4th Law - Make (the reward) it satisfying

Our brain determines whether it will repeat an activity or not based on the satisfaction it recieves from it

A good way to fill in this need is to create a habit tracker; A habit tracker will give you a visual indicator of your progess, motivating you to go forward and repeat that activity. Create a streak and try to maintain it.

Advanced tactics

To maximize the output we should try and find activities that satisfy us, to do so you can ask your self some questions

Follow the “Goldilocks” rule – Make it so that you Experience 50/50 of both sucess and failure, this will keep you coming for more.