The Power of Habit: Why we Do What We Do in life and Business...

By Charles Duhigg

Much of this book lines up with "The Tipping Point" There is an important core to this book that I want to remember...

How to change habit loops. We all have many habits. They are of the form...

Stimulus... Habit... Reward...

The Habit could be smoking, could be nail bighting, going to Facebook, getting angry.. any of thousands of things. Most people try to break a habit with self discipline... don't do that! Resist! Duhigg suggests we spend time to understand the stimulus and the reward.

1. Every time we engage in a habit, record the time, what you were doing, and what you were feeling. 

2. Record the rewards of the habit.

3. When you understand what stimulus kick off a habit, develop a specific plan to deal with the stimulus, and figure out a satisfying reward.

For example, I want to go running every morning. Instead, I just get out of bed and make coffee. In this situation, try laying out your running closes the night before and set up the coffee maker. Now, get dressed first thing in the morning, and have coffee as a reward when you get back.

You will have to play around with identifying the stimulus, and finding the appropriate rewards. Sometimes they may be simple... to relieve stress, breath deeply for a few seconds, instead of having a candy bar.  Sometimes they may be complicated... If I habitually put off financial planning because of anxiety, then what? Reward myself with a nice bottle of wine?

I want to combine this with Goldsmith's Triggers. The ideas that we will be more successful if we limit our personal change at any one time to...

1. Creating new behavior.

2. Eliminating an old behavior

3. Accepting something regretful

4. Preserving, or growing something positive.