We all have bad habits. It’s incredibly difficult to only have good habits no matter how much we want them. Hopefully, though, there will be a time when the good habits are more motivating than the bad habits. Hopefully, one day we will find it easier to change a bad habit than maintain the disruption, disguise, and dictation of responses that a bad habit invokes.
Why Change Your Bad Habit?
We are aiming for the day when good habits are more motivating to maintain than the bad habits. To do this we need to understand why we would want to change a bad habit. What’s wrong with having a few bad habits? Should you change your bad habit?
A bad habit:
1. Disrupts
When you engage in a bad habit it takes you away from something. You are choosing one set of choices over something else. A habit of checking your phone every couple of minutes is disruptive. It keeps you focused on something that isn’t in the room with you. You end up missing moments with the people around you. A habit of staying up too late is disruptive. It throws off your sleep pattern and lowers your energy.
Can you think of a common bad habit and why it would be disruptive?
2. Disguises
Bad habits are probably easier to engage in than a good habit sometimes. Why? It might help us disguise the deeper issues we need to face. Maybe that bad habit was picked up to avoid dealing with something else. It could be an intentional or unintentional decision, but if we look closely at our behavior and get in touch with our emotions and do some reflection. We can start to understand what might be motivating our bad habits.
What do you think are some of the common emotions or situations that people disguise with a bad habit?
3. Dictates
When we engage in a bad habit for an extended amount of time we are training our brains to respond in that way. A bad habit dictates how we handle situations. We automatically pick up the phone as soon as we wake up. Before we even wake up, we’re on social media. We didn’t even think about it. It just happened. You could argue that a good habit also dictates how we handle situations, but the difference is that a bad habit is often not helping us accomplish our goals and a good habit can help us move forward.
How do you know if one of your habits is a good habit or a bad habit?
Summary of Reasons to Change Your Bad Habit
In Conclusion, if we let our bad habits reign we have developed a negative coping response. By that I mean, we’re ignoring our underlying needs and we’re giving into what might be easier solutions to the pain or sadness, anxiety, or whatever emotion or situation it is that we don’t want to deal with. A bad habit might hide the problem, but it doesn’t really give us the inspiration to move on or move forward.
How do we know if we are faced with a bad habit?
Ask yourself these three things 1) Is it disruptive? 2) Does it disguise a deep issue? 3) Is it dictating in a way that helps me move forward and accomplish big things or is it holding me back?
Behavior Challenge: Reflect on one or two of your habits and consider it in light of the 3 D’s mentioned above. Is it a good habit or a bad habit?
One behavior change at a time.
