habits

The Key Thing To Do To Develop A New Habit

January 9, 2014 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

It’s the second week of the New Year. Maybe you’ve decided to work on some new habits – Lose weight (how are you going to do that?), cook at home more (when are you going to do that?), eat less bread, butter, ice cream, candy, you name it (how much less?).

Specificity and baby steps help move you toward your new habit – but something else is key, too: practice. Your brain needs to decide that this new habit, the new behavior, is its default. How does your brain get the message? By you performing – doing – that behavior over and over again.

Remember this: What gets you to Carnegie Hall (or to the podium, or to the awards ceremony)? Practice. Think about this: What makes your new healthy habit stick? Practice.

If you’ve resolved to form new healthy habits, habits you want to keep and that fit in with your lifestyle, you need to keep repeating the new behaviors for that habit over and over again. It’s like learning a language or a new game. You need to keep practicing.

Why? Our brains are lazy. They like to default to what’s easy for them – and usually that’s an old habit (both good ones and bad ones). That default behavior is easy, nice, comfortable, and doesn’t require the extra energy necessary to do something unfamiliar. Doing something that’s very familiar can be done without much thinking or energy — like eating a certain thing everyday at the same time or going for a daily run at the same time and on the same route.

The way to create a new habit and to make it “stick” is to create a new “default” pattern to replace an old one. That requires the repetitive practice of doing the same behavior over and over again – like creating a path through grass or weeds by walking on it day after day.

Some Additional Tips For Forming New Habits

Try one change at a time. Create one new habit and then begin to work on another. Since our brains are, in a sense, kind of lazy, they don’t like too much disruption or change at a time. They’re used to doing something one way, so pick one change at a time and create a habit around it.

Be committed and willing to work on your habit (goal). Decide if you’re really willing to make change(s) in your life. Are you serious or half-hearted about what you want to do? “Kinda,” “sorta” goals give you “kinda,” “sorta” results. Realistic, achievable goals produce realistic results.

Start small and specific. So many of us are guilty of all-or-nothing thinking and overly ambitious goals. Guess what happens? We shoot ourselves in our collective feet and call ourselves failures. Do it often enough and a “no can do” attitude gets solidly embedded. Aim for what you think you can do and keep doing it. That doesn’t mean not trying, it just means scale it to what you think you can accomplish with some effort. If, for example, your aim is to exercise more frequently, schedule three or four days a week at the gym instead of seven. If you would like to eat healthier, try replacing dessert with something else you enjoy, like fruit or yogurt or a very small portion of a favorite indulgence — instead of saying you’re going cold turkey and will never eat a dessert again.

Unhealthy habits develop over time. Working on healthy habits to replace unhealthy ones also requires time. Be patient. And practice.

A 13 Step Plan To Create Healthy New Habits

January 6, 2014 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Are you tired of refusing to go out to eat because you’re on the new popular diet? Are you avoiding eating with your family because you don’t want to have the same tempting food?

What about forming some healthy new habits that will help you steer clear of wacky diets and deprivation? Healthy new habits that will stick around for a while!

How Long Does It Take To Create A New Habit?

There are many factors that can affect the process, but essential for any change is doing a new behavior consistently and repetitively – which is also necessary for creating the neural connections in your brain that underlie the new habit.

We’ve been led to believe that forming a new habit takes between 21 and 28 days. Actually, there’s no solid evidence to support those numbers. The length of time it takes to form a habit is unique for each of us because of the factors that surround and influence our behavior.

In a study of habit formation published in the European Journal of Social Psychology, it took study participants 18 to 254 days, with an average of 66 days, to form their new habit. So, it could take a shorter amount of time – or it could take a lot longer — especially if you’re trying to form a new habit to displace one that’s multifaceted, that’s been around for a long time, or is a replacement for something that you love doing.

Work on one new habit at a time. Trying to create multiple new habits at the same time is confusing, difficult to do, and often ineffective. Your brain prefers simple and familiar rather than confusing and new so try not to overwhelm it with too many new behaviors at once.

The Steps

You’re ready to do what it takes to create a new habit. What do you do and how do you do it? Here’s the process:

Describe, as specifically as possible, what you want to do. Instead of saying “I want to eat less,” identify how many calories or how many meals. Instead of saying “I’ll drink more water,” identify how many glasses you’ll drink a day.
Write your new habit down. The most important thing is not that it’s inscribed but that writing it down reinforces it in your mind.
Visualize the successful end result — like being in shape to run a 5K after creating new eating and workout habits. It might help to visualize yourself doing your new behavior and the results that will come from it.
Enlist as much support and accountability as you can from people you know who will be willing to help – identify the naysayers and saboteurs and ignore or avoid them. Remember, you’re focusing on the positive end result, not on the problems you might encounter getting there.
Buddy up with a friend who already has the habit you want to create. This serves as an accountability check and is also positive motivation. If you go to the gym with a friend who already has a habit of going to the gym it’s quite likely you will continue to go. Going with a friend who moans and whines about the gym and is ready to quit when the slightest breeze blows is not a likely predictor of success.
Set up triggers to help cue the new action for your habit each and every time that you do it. Leave yourself notes, have a coworker remind you, put a rubber band on your wrist, set up roadblocks to temptation or to the vending machine down the hall from your office.
Create a ritual around your new behavior – do the same thing every time and the same way each day so that it becomes second nature (and embedded in your brain’s hard wiring.) Habits are time and energy savers and brains like comfort. Doing the same thing the same way makes it nice and easy for your brain.
Think of potential obstacles, animate or inanimate, and plan on how to deal with them. Make the desirable things easy to do and the “bad” things difficult to do. Remove temptation, i.e. throw out the junk food and don’t walk past the bakery with the tantalizing smells that waft onto the street.
Take baby steps. It’s admirable to say that you want to walk for an hour each day. First work on getting out of bed early enough to fit in the time for exercise. Make it easy and leave your walking clothes in plain sight. Leave your running shoes where you’re likely to trip over them (don’t trip over them just make it hard to ignore them). Get out the door and commit to walking ten minutes each day. Hold yourself to the ten minutes, just do it every day until that part of the habit becomes embedded. Then build on it. Walk for 20 minutes, then thirty.
Make positive choices. Each time you’re at a decision point as to whether or not to carry out the action for your new habit think about why you want to do it. Why is the new habit important, what is the long-term benefit, how great will you feel when you accomplish it? If you’re giving up an old space and time-taker-upper habit you need to replace that behavior with something else. If you’re trying to create a habit of not watching so much television what are you going to do with that time instead?
Keep a visible reminder of your progress, no matter how big or small. Make graphs, use pictures, applaud each time you have fruit instead of cake for dessert, use a pedometer to calculate how many steps you walk each day. Yell hallelujah when your pants zip up without having to suck in your stomach. Positive feedback is essential.
Anticipate imperfection. The road may be bumpy, so have a plan to regroup. If something in your action plan doesn’t work, reevaluate. If you really can’t get out of bed at 5:30 AM to exercise then stopping at the gym on the way home from work might be a better solution (hint: don’t go home first because it requires megamotivation to get back out to the gym). Your interest may start to wane in a couple of weeks or so into the new actions so keep your cues and triggers in place to remind you to stick with it.
Be confident. Believe that you can achieve what you have set out to do. Celebrate all your achievements no matter how big or small.

Slow Down You Eat Way Too Fast

January 13, 2013 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Do you wolf your food down so quickly that it’s gone before you realize you’ve eaten it all – and then you’re still hungry and staring at an empty plate?

Mothers around the world often say the same thing: slow down and chew your food. Well, what do you know, there’s something to it.
According to an article in the New York Times, studies show that people who eat quickly eat more calories than they would if they ate a bit more slowly. The people who ate more slowly also felt fuller.
A recent study showed that hormones that give you feelings of fullness, or satiety, are more pronounced when people eat slowly. Subjects given identical servings of ice cream released more of these hormones when they ate it in 30 minutes instead of 5 minutes.
It leads to eating less, too. According to an article published in The Journal of the American Dietetic Association people who ate at a slow pace compared to when they chowed down very quickly said they were fuller and ending up eating about 10 percent fewer calories.

An analysis of surveys completed by 3287 adults (1122 men, 2165 women), ages 30-69, concluded that eating until they’re full and eating quickly are associated with being overweight and that these combined behaviors might have a significant impact on being overweight.

Twenty Minutes Or Less

Research has shown that Americans start and finish their meals — and clear the table — in less than 20 minutes. A study published in the journal Appetite, found that people eating lunch by themselves in a fast food restaurant finish in 11 minutes. They finish in13 minutes in a workplace cafeteria and in 28 minutes at a moderately priced restaurant. Eating with three other people takes about twice as long – which can still end up being a really short chunk of time.

Once again, Moms are right – slow down when you eat. (Doesn’t that often go with don’t grab?) Slowing down allows you and your brain to register a feeling of fullness and may even mean that you eat fewer calories. You might even have time to really taste and enjoy your food, too.

This article is part of the 30 day series of blog posts called: 30 Easy Tips for Looser Pants and Excellent Energy.

Practice Makes Perfect (Or At Least Good)– Especially With Habits

January 12, 2013 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

What gets you to Carnegie Hall? Practice. What makes your new healthy behaviors stick? Practice.

If you’ve resolved to form new healthy habits, ones you want to keep and that fit in with your lifestyle, you need to keep repeating those new behaviors over and over again. It’s like learning a language or a new game. You need to keep practicing.

Why? Our brains are lazy. They like to default to what’s easy for them – and usually that’s an old habit (both good ones and bad ones). That default is what takes the least amount of energy and it’s nice and comfortable. Doing something that’s very familiar can be done without much thinking or energy — like eating a certain thing everyday at the same time or going for a daily run at the same time and on the same route.

Some Additional Tips

You might like to try one change at a time instead of making too many resolutions or setting too many goals. Create one new habit and then begin to work on another. Since our brains are, in a sense, kind of lazy, they don’t like too much disruption or change at a time. They’re used to doing something one way, so pick one change at a time and create a habit around it.

Be committed and willing to work on your goal(s). Decide if you’re really willing to make change(s) in your life. Are you serious or half-hearted about what you want to do? “Kinda,” “sorta” goals give you “kinda,” “sorta” results. Realistic, achievable goals produce realistic results.

Start Small And Specific. So many of us are guilty of all-or-nothing thinking and overly ambitious goals. Guess what happens? We shoot ourselves in our collective feet and call ourselves failures. Do it often enough and a “no can do” attitude gets solidly embedded. Make resolutions you think you can keep. If, for example, your aim is to exercise more frequently, schedule three or four days a week at the gym instead of seven. If you would like to eat healthier, try replacing dessert with something else you enjoy, like fruit or yogurt or a very small portion of a favorite indulgence — instead of seeing your diet as a form of punishment.

Unhealthy behaviors develop over time. Creating healthy behaviors to replace those unhealthy ones also requires time. Be patient. And practice.

This article is part of the 30 day series of blog posts called: 30 Easy Tips for Looser Pants and Excellent Energy.

Prep For Your Big Event And Snag An A . . .

May 12, 2011 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

A for Awesome, because that’s how you’ll feel.

Don’t you hate it: you’ve been so much attention to what you eat and your healthy eating habits are really getting grooved. You’re starting to feel and look great, but, oh boy, you have to go to something big. It could be a wedding, a dinner party, or dinner at a fabulous restaurant.

First thought: I’m going shopping for something great to wear.

Second thought: The food is going to be awesome. Is this going to make me blow my careful eating and, then, forget it — it’s all down hill from there.

The Dilemma

You want to enjoy yourself and be able to have some of the restaurant’s “specialty of the house” or a bunch of hors d’ oeuvres followed by a delicious piece of cake at your friend’s wedding.

What To Do?

Prep like your final exam is tomorrow.

Remember cramming for finals? Hit the books and collect some information. Research the menu of the restaurant you will be going to or call your host or event planner to find out what will be served at your event.

Many restaurants have their menus online – or you can stop in for a preview. If you nicely give your host, the caterer, or the event planner a solid reason for wanting to know the menu, you’ll be surprised at how accommodating most can be.

After you’ve researched what can be ordered and/or what will be served, you can then come up with your plan. If you want that fantastic dessert perhaps you decide to keep your hand out of the breadbasket. Do you want to have wine with dinner? Maybe forego a cocktail (or two) – and its calories – before dinner. Want the very special hors d’oeuvre? Maybe dessert gets jettisoned.

The point is: You are in control and can choose what you want to do. But planning is important. Make up your mind what you’re going to do ahead of time and commit to it.

A game time decision means that you’re making decisions when too many enticements are already in front of you. That’s not easy to do. So, do your research, come up with a plan, and stick to it. Allow yourself something special – don’t take that away. But, maybe stick to one or two special treats, not an ongoing feast. You’ll feel fantastic, in control, and tremendously proud of yourself. You’ll have had something delicious -– and your new clothes will still look just as great. Most importantly, those new healthy eating habits are still intact and have and will continue to serve you well.