If it were enough to gather the will into a fist and stick to a new pattern of behavior for only 21 days for the habits to become permanent, everyone would be happy.
In about six months, the world would be close to perfection. But that did not happen.
21 days is just one of the myths that we humans are so willing to believe.
I have a whole list of qualities that I would like to possess, to form a habit. For example, early awakening, proper nutrition and many others.
I don't think you have any less. Someone may want to quit smoking or start some useful business. But why are these habits still at the planning stage? It's not about time!
Time to change life
The popular belief that it takes 21 days to form a habit comes from the experience of plastic surgeon Maxwell Maltz. In 1950, he noted that it takes at least 21 days for patients to get used to a new appearance or amputation.
Maltz suggested that changes in the psyche occur in at least 21 days. During this time, a mental image is formed that overshadows the person's past habits. In 1960, his book "Psychocybernetics" was published, and this idea penetrated the masses.
The world started talking about "21 days" as a kind of unchanging "deadline" beyond which we expect the result. But after a while, instead of success, people got disappointed. Few managed to change themselves.
Not 21 days?
Decades later, psychologists at University College London decided to test how long it actually takes to form a new habit.
They studied the behavior of 96 participants for 12 weeks. Someone had to drink a bottle of water during lunch, others worked out 15 minutes before dinner.
On average, according to their data, a habit is formed in two months (66 days). However, for each person, depending on the type of habit, the amount of time required varies widely.
Psychologists say that it can take from 18 to 254 days. It's not three weeks, it's eight months!
Look at the root
But I think that not everyone will be able to change themselves in eight months. Or a year or a year and a half. Maybe it's not even about time. Then what?
It seems to me that among the factors necessary for establishing a habit, there is no time at all. There is the strength of desire, the degree of thinking and the seriousness of the necessary changes.
When we talk about a habit, we mean something useful that will help us rise above our former self. No one wants to deliberately start bad habits.
Bad habits are acquired automatically, and it's not difficult. It is worth a little gape, and that's it!
Good habits are always an overcoming that requires psychological and physical effort.
Going up is always harder than going down
Psychological forces are needed to make these changes permanent. And the more serious changes are coming, the more strength is needed.
But sometimes it comes naturally. There are people who, after serious life vicissitudes, immediately get rid of their bad habits. And they themselves note that this happened easily.
Someone after reading a certain book becomes a vegetarian in a day, someone quits smoking. And it happens naturally. This happens when the degree of thinking of a person rises sharply.
For him, a new habit immediately becomes part of his worldview. And he does not need to count 21 or 66 days.
You may want some changes, but not be ready for them. This, for example, applies to those who start smoking again after a while.
His volitional efforts have been exhausted, and he himself has not yet changed dramatically to make the new habit natural. Then he rolls back again.
So I want to believe in 21 days, but, unfortunately, everything is much more complicated. Going up is always harder than going down.
If it were enough to gather the will into a fist and stick to a new pattern of behavior for only 21 days for the habits to become permanent, everyone would be happy. In about six months, the world would be close to perfection. But that did not happen. 21 days is just one of the myths that we humans are so willing to believe.
Each of us has a whole list of qualities that I would like to have, to form a habit. For example, early awakening, proper nutrition and many others. I don't think you have any less. Someone may want to quit smoking or start some useful business. But why are these habits still at the planning stage? It's not about time!
Time to change life
The popular belief that it takes 21 days to form a habit comes from the experience of plastic surgeon Maxwell Maltz. In 1950, he noted that it takes at least 21 days for patients to get used to a new appearance or amputation.
Maltz suggested that changes in the psyche occur in at least 21 days. During this time, a mental image is formed that overshadows the person's past habits. In 1960, his book "Psychocybernetics" was published, and this idea penetrated the masses. The world started talking about "21 days" as a kind of unchanging "deadline" beyond which we expect the result. But after a while, instead of success, people got disappointed. Few managed to change themselves.
Decades later, psychologists at University College London decided to test how long it actually takes to form a new habit. They studied the behavior of 96 participants for 12 weeks. Someone had to drink a bottle of water during lunch, others worked out 15 minutes before dinner.
On average, according to their data, a habit is formed in two months (66 days). However, for each person, depending on the type of habit, the amount of time required varies widely. Psychologists say that it can take from 18 to 254 days. It's not three weeks, it's eight months!
Look at the root
Not everyone can change themselves in eight months. Or a year or a year and a half. Maybe it's not even about time. Then what? It seems to me that among the factors necessary for establishing a habit, there is no time at all. There is the strength of desire, the degree of thinking and the seriousness of the necessary changes.
When we talk about a habit, we mean something useful that will help us rise above our former self. No one wants to deliberately develop bad habits. Bad habits are acquired automatically, and it's not difficult. It is worth a little gape, and that's it!
Good habits are always an overcoming that requires psychological and physical effort. Going up is always harder than going down. Psychological forces are needed to make these changes permanent. And the more serious changes are coming, the more strength is needed.
But sometimes it comes naturally. There are people who, after serious life vicissitudes, immediately get rid of their bad habits. And they themselves note that this happened easily.
Someone after reading a certain book becomes a vegetarian in a day, someone quits smoking. And it happens naturally. This happens when the degree of thinking of a person rises sharply. For him, a new habit immediately becomes part of his worldview. And he does not need to count 21 or 66 days.
You may want some changes, but not be ready for them. This, for example, applies to those who start smoking again after a while. His volitional efforts have been exhausted, and he himself has not yet changed dramatically to make the new habit natural. Then he rolls back again.
So I want to believe in 21 days, but, unfortunately, everything is much more complicated. Going up is always harder than going down.
Ask Google a question about the period of habit formation, and you will probably find out that it only takes 21 days. Alternatively: 18, 28 or even 31 days. The numbers vary, but there is no clear answer. Many experts believe that if you simply repeat a behavior pattern for a certain number of days, it is bound to become a habit. But you yourself know that some habits are formed instantly, and some are very long and difficult.
The duration of this process depends on the strength and persistence of the old behavioral pattern. Adopting a healthy diet will take longer for those who have eaten ice cream every day for ten years than for those who have eaten it once a week. Instead of focusing on a specific deadline, try using the following strategies to speed up the process.
1. Set yourself small but specific goals.
If you're working on developing a habit, you probably have ambitious goals, such as keeping your house in order on a regular basis or going to the gym every other day. They're essential for your long-term motivation, but they won't help you develop and stick with new habits. Why? Imagine setting the abstract goal of "being more organized." It's very foggy and blurry, so you won't be able to track your own progress. Even if you, say, organize all the things in the closet in one day, you will still be upset when you look at a messy kitchen. A habit is a repetitive action, so set a small, specific behavioral goal. For example, instead of "being more organized," try "doing the laundry and vacuuming every Sunday morning." This goal works because it is specific. This is a behavioral pattern that you can repeat over and over again until it becomes automatic, that is, habitual.
2. Make it easy for yourself
Let's say you want to switch to a healthy diet. You're motivated to change and you enjoy eating healthy, so why not develop the habit? Think about the psychological barriers that might stop you. Maybe you're too tired to cook after work, so you end up ordering pizza. Consider ways to bypass the barrier. You can take a day off each week to prepare meals for the next five days. In other words, in order not to be disappointed in yourself, think about ways to remove such barriers and facilitate the process of habit formation.
3. Find someone to control you
Such a “supervisory body” increases motivation. Sometimes we may not live up to our own inner expectations, but we hate not to live up to the expectations of others. Use psychology to your advantage by involving another person in the process. He can encourage you, stimulate you and require you to report on the work already done on yourself. If you want to develop the habit of going to the gym regularly, find a friend who wants to do the same and create a shared workout schedule. On those days when you want to lie on the couch and be lazy, remember that you are letting a friend down.
4. Use external and internal reminders
Experiment with sticky notes, make lists, set up daily alerts on your phone, or use any other external reminder tool. Remember that the process of forming a new behavioral model means abandoning the old one. In addition to creating reminders of the right behavior, you may need to remind yourself not to throw dirty clothes on the floor, for example. Internal reminders are also important. If you are trapped in a useless thought process, break the pattern. Choose a positive and supportive "mantra". If you catch yourself thinking "I hate going to the gym," counter it with the opposite thought, "...but I love how my body feels after a workout."
5. Give yourself enough time
Remember that habit formation is not a straight and flat road. If you miss one day, don't panic or suffer. One small mistake won't undo all the work you've already done. Developing new habits takes time, but with the right strategic approach, you can definitely do it.
We do many things in our daily lives out of habit, without thinking, “on autopilot”; no motivation is needed. This behavior allows us not to strain too much where it is quite possible to do without it.
But habits are not only useful, but also harmful. And if the useful ones make life easier for us, then the harmful ones sometimes greatly complicate it.
Almost any habit can be formed: we gradually get used to everything. But in order to form different habits in different people different deadlines are required.
Some kind of habit can form already on the 3rd day: you watched TV a couple of times while eating, and when you sit down at the table for the third time, your hand will reach for the remote control itself: a conditioned reflex has developed.
It may take several months to form another habit, or the same one, but for another person... And, by the way, bad habits are formed faster and easier than good ones)))
Habit is the result of repeated repetition. And their formation is simply a matter of perseverance and deliberate practice. Aristotle wrote about this: “We are what we constantly do. Perfection, therefore, is not an act, but a habit.
And, as is usually the case, the path to perfection is not a straight line, but a curve: at first, the process of developing automatism goes faster, and then slows down.
The figure shows that, for example, a glass of water in the morning (blue line of the graph) has become a habit for a particular person in about 20 days. It took over 80 days for him to get into the habit of doing 50 squats in the morning (pink line). The red line of the graph shows average term habit formation - 66 days.
Where did the number 21 come from?
In the 50s of the 20th century, plastic surgeon Maxwell Maltz drew attention to a pattern: after plastic surgery, the patient needed about three weeks to get used to his new face, which he saw in the mirror. He also noticed that it also took him about 21 days to form a new habit.
Maltz wrote about this experience in his book Psycho-Cybernetics: “These and many other frequently observed phenomena, as a rule, show that it is required minimum 21 days in order for the old mental image to dissipate and be replaced by a new one. The book became a bestseller. Since then, it has been quoted many times, gradually forgetting that Maltz wrote in it: "at least 21 days."
The myth quickly took root: 21 days is short enough to inspire and long enough to be believable. Who doesn't love the idea of changing their life in 3 weeks?
In order for a habit to form, you need:
First, the repetition of its repetition: any habit begins with the first step, an act ("sow an act - you reap a habit"), then repeated many times; we do something day after day, sometimes making an effort on ourselves, and sooner or later it becomes our habit: it becomes easier to do it, less and less effort is required.
Secondly, positive emotions: in order for a habit to form, it must be “reinforced” by positive emotions, the process of its formation must be comfortable, it is impossible in the conditions of struggle with oneself, prohibitions and restrictions, i.e. under conditions of stress.
In stress, a person tends to unconsciously "roll" into habitual behavior. Therefore, until a useful skill has been consolidated and a new behavior has not become habitual, stresses are dangerous with “breakdowns”: this is how we quit, as soon as we start, eat right, or do gymnastics, or run in the morning.
The more complex the habit, the less pleasure it delivers, the longer it takes to develop. The simpler, more effective, and more enjoyable a habit is, the faster it will become automatic.
Therefore, our emotional attitude to what we want to make our habit is very important: approval, pleasure, joyful facial expression, smile. A negative attitude, on the contrary, prevents the formation of a habit, therefore, all your negativity, your discontent, irritation must be removed in a timely manner. Fortunately, this is possible: our emotional attitude to what is happening is something that we can change at any time!
This can serve as an indicator: if we feel irritated, if we start scolding or blaming ourselves, then we are doing something wrong.
We can think ahead of the reward system: make a list of things that give us pleasure and can therefore serve as rewards when reinforcing the necessary useful skills.
In the end, it doesn't really matter how many days it takes you to form the right habit. Another thing is much more important: in any case Can you do it!
