Creating Healthy Habits

“Atomic Habits” by James Clear is a must read if you struggle with establishing habits. 

Instead of making big changes, he encourages establishing a habit and then scaling it. For example if you want to go to the gym every day, start with just packing your gym bag, then driving to the gym, then going in for five minutes, then ten minutes and so on and so forth. If you’re finding it is difficult to move to the next level, stay at that level until it feels established. 

“Choose to have the right thing slowly rather than the wrong thing now.” - James Clear

Another thing I find helpful for people that battle with an internal critic. Because it’s when we go outside of our comfort zone and there is room to fail is when our critic can get loud. 

So I like to think, “I love who I currently am and I love who I am becoming. I’m not trying to destroy my current self for some idealized version of myself. I am challenging myself because I love myself, because I’m curious about how I can grow and participate in a variety of experiences. I’m going to try my best, I’m going to make mistakes, I’m going to learn a lot, and see where that takes me.” 

“Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.” ~ James Clear