Get Rid Of Your Bad Habits In 7 Easy Steps

Most people don’t have that willingness to break bad habits. They have a lot of excuses and they talk like victims. – Carlos Santana

There are two traits that suck the life out of you. Poor excuses and self pity. And when it comes to dealing with bad habits and attempting to rid of em, none of those traits are helpful. In fact they’re detrimental to your success.

And by success I mean destroying your bad habits and developing good habits, successfully. Once you’re stuck in the mindset of making excuses and acting like a victim, it feels like quick sand. The more you struggle with it, the more difficult it becomes.

Let me show you how you can get rid of your bad habits in 7 easy steps to help you come out on top!

1. Get Em Down On Paper

And If you’re not a fan of using paper in this day in age, go ahead and use something like Evernote. But make sure you get ALL your bad habits written out. Not only does this show you’re serious about getting rid of your bad habits, it makes it easier for you to keep an eye on it.

Write down the habits you feel are dragging you down the most and negatively affecting your life in some way.

2. Categorize Your Habits

Some habits can be dealt with quicker than others, some habits are a lot more urgent than others. For example – smoking habits are a lot more urgent because they’re potentially life threatening. Where as habits like allowing clutter in your office to pile up wouldn’t be as urgent.

Categorize your habits like this:

High Priority.
Medium Priority.
Low Priority.
Or whichever way you feel works best for you.

3. Set Up Boundaries

When you’re on the verge of destroying your bad habits or minimizing them you’re bound to face a lot of distractions. For example – If you’re trying to quit smoking, you’re bound to notice other smokers, or be around friends and family who smoke.

And you’re bound to notice the cigarette packets behind the counter in the shop. Using the smoking example, you’d be best off –

Asking your friends to not smoke around you.
Letting your family know you’re trying to quit.
Informing everybody to prevent them asking you anything related to smoking.
Replacing the bad habit of smoking with a good habit, like writing or bike riding.
The same goes for any other bad habit you want to get rid of. Another example would be over spending. In this case you’d be best off –

Splurging once a month instead of spending multiple times per week.
Replacing your habit of over spending with over saving.
Figuring out ways to earn more money (so you can afford to over spend).
And so on!

4. Focus On 1 Habit At A Time

If a fox was to chase more than 1 rabbit at a time, there’s no doubt the fox would fail to catch even 1. And If a snake was to focus on more than one mouse at a time, it would be fighting a losing battle.

The same goes for your bad habits. You might have more than one bad habit to conquer, and yes I know you’re eager to stomp them out, but try to relax. Focus on 1 habit at a time.

That way you can put ALL your focus into that 1 bad habit you want to get rid of. And then when that habits been dealt with, you can move onto the next one.

That’s the strategy the fox and the snake uses to succeed at catching their prey. And that’s the strategy you should use to kill off those habits one at a time.

5. Participate with a friend

Or whoever you like. I’ve noticed when I do an activity with someone other than just myself, it pushes and motivates me more than I’d imagine. If I want to get some cardio done,and I have a partner, I’m fired up and more inclined to get it done.

Psychology just does that. Try it yourself and you’ll be surprised.

6. Review Your Progress

If you don’t know how well you’ve been doing, you won’t know If you’re progressing or not. You won’t know If you’re getting any closer to achieving your goals.

Write down the progress you make every day and keep it recorded. Treat it like a 30 day challenge or something similar. Check up on your progress as often as you can and make adjustments as you go along If needed.

You might not succeed the first time around or even the 2nd 3rd 4th or 5th time around, but when you do you’ll know about it. Because the evidence will be there to back it up. 🙂

7. Celebrate Your Success

Celebrate what you want to see more of. – Tom Peters

When you finally achieve your goal and rid of that nasty habit, celebrate it. Celebrate it in any way you know best. Whether that’s treating yourself to a spa, a night out, a restaurant, a party, a get together, it doesn’t matter.

But what matters is that you celebrate it and make it known because you’ll deserve it. Most of us are quick to pick at our failures and mistakes, yet we’re not so quick to mention or celebrate our successes. So with each bad habit you replace, make an effort to do that. And do it well!

Got something to say? Let me know in the comments.