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« on: February 27, 2020, 02:28:41 PM »
PROBLEM 4: Not Changing Your Environment
SOLUTION: Build an environment that promotes good habits.
I have never seen a person consistently stick to positive habits in a negative environment. You can frame this statement in many different ways:
It is nearly impossible to eat healthy all of the time if you are constantly surrounded by unhealthy food.
It is nearly impossible to remain positive all of the time if you are constantly surrounded by negative people.
It is nearly impossible to focus on a single task if you are constantly bombarded with text messages, notifications, emails, questions, and other digital distractions.
It is nearly impossible to not drink if you are constantly surrounded by alcohol.
And so on.
We rarely admit it (or even realize it), but our behaviors are often a simple response to the environment we find ourselves in.
In fact, you can assume that the lifestyle you have today (all of your habits) is largely a product of the environment you live in each day. The single biggest change that will make a new habit easier is performing it in an environment that is designed to make that habit succeed. For example, let’s say that your New Year’s resolution is to reduce stress in your life and live in a more focused manner.
Here is the current situation:
Every morning, the alarm on your phone goes off. You pick up the phone, turn off the alarm, and immediately start checking email and social media. Before you have even made it out of bed, you are already thinking about a half dozen new emails. Maybe you’ve already responded to a few. You also browsed the latest updates on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, so those messages and headlines are swimming around in your mind too. You haven’t even dressed yet, but your mind is already distracted and stressed.
If this scene sounds familiar and you want to change your habit, then the easiest way to do it is to change your environment. Don’t keep your phone in your room. The phone is the thing that causes all of the problems, so change the environment. Buy a regular alarm clock (shockingly old school, I know) and charge your phone in another room (or, at least, across the room away from your bed).
You can change the digital environment too. Turn off all push notifications on your phone. You can even remove your email and social media apps from the home screen and hide them somewhere else on the phone. I deleted all of my apps from my phone for a month just to see how it would go. I missed them very little.
If your environment doesn’t change, you probably won’t either.
Further reading: This Simple Equation Reveals How Habits Shape Your Health, Happiness, and Wealth