9 Things to Know To Make Building And Breaking Habits More Effective

Micheala Barsotti:

Hey everyone. Welcome back to another episode of The 5% Way Podcast with your host, Paul Salter and myself, co-host Micheala Barsotti. I am so excited for today’s podcast because we are going to dive into all the effective strategies when it comes to building healthy habits. On the flip side, we’re going to talk about how to break old habits that are no longer serving us. Paul, you already know that I love this topic. I love, love, love to help people break things down and realize that it’s the little things done over and over again, repeatedly that are going to lead us to success rather than going all in or making these giant changes at once and just helping people realize the power of habit all together. It’s like you can literally change your life by changing your behaviors.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. I think the one thing I want to add just between the two of us, I feel like we’ve read every popularized New York Times best selling habit book and one of us might have read Atomic Habits like a dozen times, and I’m not looking at [inaudible 00:02:02].

Micheala Barsotti:

Might have a reference or two in today’s chat. But there really is just so much to learn when it comes to building habits. It’s one of those things, just like most things with approaching your healthy lifestyle and your journey. It’s simple. We all know we need to do more of the things that lead us to healthier habits and do less of those habits that aren’t serving us. But it’s still extremely hard when it comes to breaking habits that have been ingrained for years and years and years. And on the flip side, just like completely changing things and trying to adapt to these healthier habits. I really hope that today, by tuning in, you guys learn the steps that it takes to keep this top of mind when it comes to successfully building habits.

I think where we should really start is just defining habits. Habits are the small decisions and actions that you perform every single day, the decisions you make and the actions you perform are what creates habits and they account for about 40% of our behaviors each day. Thinking about that, 40% of our behaviors are automatic. We don’t even think about them. We just do them. So it’s so crucial to understand that building new habits and also understanding how old ones are working for us is so important when it comes to making progress with our health and really any goal in life in general.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. I’ll add one more thing to that because you’re bringing such a good point. Habits are really like smack dab in the middle of just this total transformation from the inside out, which is obviously what we talk about so much here on The 5% Way Podcast. When we tackle and break down habits, like we’re going to do in today’s episode, you’re going to hear us talk a lot about like, whether it’s the self-talk, our thoughts and our beliefs, all of which influence our actions that essentially, hopefully become habits, but then the impact habits come on shaping our results, our identity, and our reality. We always go back to success and results beginning in the mind.

But when it comes to habit formation, they have such a strong impact on everything after themselves in the chain being the results, the identity and the reality, and are so strongly influenced by the first couple of pieces in the chain that really grasping and understanding how to break down your habit formation or deconstruction into the simplest of terms and learn some strategies to improve it, is truly going to be an accelerator when it comes to making progress in achieving those wins you desire.

Micheala Barsotti:

I don’t want to butcher this, but in the book Atomic Habits, James Clear talks about looking at the trajectory of your life and basically, he uses the example, you could be a millionaire, but if your actions don’t align with… If you’re not saving money or if you’re not budgeting appropriately, you’re not going to be a millionaire for very long. Whereas on the flip side, you could be poor, but if you’re budgeting and you’re saving every single day, who is going to be more successful? The millionaire is going to burn out, he’s going to end up with no money. It just goes to show the same thing. It’s like those little habits, which we’ll talk about, it’s like stacking on top of one another, that’s going to lead you to success.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely.

Micheala Barsotti:

We came up with multiple factors that we really want you to keep top of mind when it comes to building or breaking habits that are no longer serving you. Let’s just dive right on in with number one, the first one, so, so important is starting incredibly small. We just kind of hinted at this, but the single most important skill of behavior change as a whole is to feel successful. We want to achieve these tiny successes, these like quick, tiny successes each day, and you want to make it so easy for yourself that you can’t say no, something that you don’t need motivation to drive you to do the thing. You can just do it because it’s that small. I think where people get tripped up here is they think that it’s too small, it’s not going to matter. When in reality, those are the ones that matter because those are the ones that you’re going to be able to consistently do day after day.

Paul Salter:

I couldn’t agree more. And it’s really eerie timing because this was not intentional, but my social media post going on today, it’s Monday as we record, it’s all about the power of progress and this fits so beautifully because what really keeps us motivated when we’re attaining any goal or aspiring to attain that goal is progress. And if we can choose a stupidly small little action, separate decision to make every single day and actually follow through on that commitment to ourselves, well there’s progress. It also creates this nice little flood of dopamine to our brain, that feel good neurotransmitter that makes us want to, well look at that, do more of the same thing we just did and that tiny, tiny baby step leads to… It’s like the simple cliche analogy of, you got to put one foot in front of the other to run a marathon, like these tiny little steps absolutely add up to massive change.

Micheala Barsotti:

And I just wanted to give a little like example because I’m actually reading now Tiny Habits. The two like most famous, if you will, habit books are the Atomic Habits and then Tiny Habits, and I’ve never read Tiny Habits so that’s the one I’m on, but he talks about the Maui habits. This is like, literally takes three seconds out of your day. But the idea behind it is you start off your day with a success and a win right off the bat. You get up out of bed, your feet hit the floor and you immediately say, “It’s going to be a great day.”

He even talks about how, even if he feels like in that day it’s not necessarily going to be a great day, he still says it, but instead he might change it to, “It’s going to be a great day somehow.” It’s just creating positivity right off the bat so you’re automatically in this mindset where you’re like, “I’m going to own it today. I’m going to win today.” And going back to those as little habits, it’s something so, so small by saying that out loud, but it can be so powerful in what your actions are for the rest of the day.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. That’s a perfect example that fits that mold we kind of teach about where our self-talk and word choice influences our thoughts and our beliefs and our actions and so forth down through habits and outcomes, and it also reminds me of, I can’t remember his name, but I think he’s like an ex admiral in the Navy. He wrote a book literally called Make Your Bed, and it’s kind of the same principle. It takes what, five seconds, unless you’ve got a really big California king bed or your dogs just screwed up the sheets, to make your bed, it takes a little, little time commitment from you. But that tiny habit, that tiny action has such a powerful ripple effect on many aspects of your day, many parts of your life, just because you started with five, maybe 30 seconds.

Micheala Barsotti:

Yes for sure. So number one, start small. Number two is increasing your habit in small ways. The whole idea about getting a little bit better each day. Paul, can you kind of touch on this one?

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. What comes to mind for me is like don’t bite off more than you can chew. A great example we have is, you and I really are working closely with new members of either the 5% community or the 5% fundamentals program and we’re working with someone who has very little to maybe no experience, formally counting calories or macros or portion control. We’re really indoctrinating them into our approach to simplicity, uniqueness and sustainability when it comes to building a foundation of healthy eating habits. One of our tangible outcomes in the beginning stages together is the arrival at building this individualized framework or blueprint for them that is in line with how they want to feel, but also their lifestyle, their goals and their preferences. When we teach them this, we don’t just hand it to them with a couple resources and expect them to follow it within 24 hours.

We tell them just to focus on one meal, maybe even just mastering one portion control of one nutrient at that meal. We’re starting really small and then when they’ve mastered managing either that portion and maybe it’s that meal, then we say, “Now, let’s tackle a second meal.” We start small to really reinforce what we just talked about is we want to start with small things that we can handle to rack up quick success, build positive momentum and then ride the hell out of that wave of momentum for as long as possible.

Micheala Barsotti:

Yep. It’s just goes back to, we’ve all experienced it when we want to try a new habit or try to create a new habit and we go too hard too soon. And what happens? You immediately burn out. I always say to clients, “You could have three days in a row where you’ve done five things, but if you are not doing those five things for the next week, two weeks, next couple of months, what grade is that?” I would rather have you do one little thing each day for the whole year and be consistent with that, than try to do these big things and make these big changes, but it’s just not sustainable.

Paul Salter:

Well said.

Micheala Barsotti:

That kind of leads us into the next one because as you’re getting 1% better every day, your habits are going to grow, right? For instance, let’s say you are reading every single day; that’s one of my personal goals right now. As we build up this habit, we want to break it down into chunks. Let’s say I have a goal to read 10 minutes a day and I’m crushing that goal so then I increase it, I get to 15. Next thing you know, I’m at 30 minutes a day of reading. Well, 30 minutes might not be feasible for me to set aside 30 minutes every single day to read but what I might be able to do is break that up.

I might be able to do 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes at night. Rather than just throwing the whole goal away for the day, because you can’t do your 30 minutes instead, break it up into little bits. The same thing with walking, this is another one that I think is so great. It’s like, okay, you have a goal to move 30 minutes every single day, go for a three 10 minute walks throughout your day.

Paul Salter:

For me, what comes up is like this, it’s almost like a gamification or psychological warfare on your inner voice. Like you want to read 30 minutes a day. Great. Maybe your schedule, it’s very hard to find 30 consecutive minutes in a row to do so, so you break it up. And it reminds me of like, when I’m doing an exercise in the gym, I dread, or I’m doing like a set of a very high number of repetitions. I don’t count to 25 repetitions if I’m doing sets of 25. I’ll count to five, five different times. Like I’ll do little chunks and break it up like that because they’re more digestible in this case psychologically to help me rack up a quick win, stack one after the other and then eventually get to that goal. I think this is just an excellent, excellent tool to keep in mind. If you have a goal, how can you gamify it, if you will, to make it more digestible so that it gets done.

Micheala Barsotti:

Consistency is always key. So however you can find a way to execute consistently, ride with it. And you kind of just said it, but our next one we lead into with habit stacking and this is so beyond powerful. Talk a little bit more about habit stacking.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. Like, everyone listening, us included, has struggled at one point in their life trying to build a new habit. It’s not, for most often, lack of effort, sometimes it’s for lack of why or lack of attaching a strong emotion to it, but that’s a conversation for later on. But at the end of the day, you already have so many habits in place. Like Micheala shared in the beginning, probably 40% of your day is dictated by habits that are operating on autopilot in the background. So if you’re trying to add a new habit, one of the easiest ways to set yourself up for success is to add it at a time in which you are already completing another habit. One of the most overused but very relatable and simplistic examples out there to really exemplify anchoring or stacking a new habit is brushing your teeth.

Hopefully, everybody listening is brushing their teeth twice per day. But if you’re already brushing your teeth when you wake up and you’re looking to add two minutes of meditation to your routine, one of the best opportunities to make sure that new habit sticks is do it right before or right after brushing your teeth because you’re already going to the bathroom to brush your teeth, that can be your cue. One of the things I’ll go ahead and share now, because I think that’s a good time is like, every habit can be deconstructed into multiple elements, depending what book you read or what habit philosophy you are familiar with. You’ll hear different yet very similar terms. One of the most, I guess, early on elemental breakdowns of habit formation was done by Charles Duhigg in his book, The Power of Habit, where we have a cue which leads to a routine or a habit to elicit a reward.

Essentially, when it comes to stacking habits, you want to find a cue that’s already taking place, and that cue is a present habit like brushing your teeth or washing your face, whatever it may be and trying to add your habit immediately before, during or after that habit. That way, you already know you’re getting the one done and you’re a hell of a lot more likely to get the second one done because it’s already set in stone when it comes to having all three boxes checked. There’s a cue, a routine and a reward and you’re just anchoring on or stacking onto that cue.

Micheala Barsotti:

Another example there, because this is one that I always, whenever I start working with somebody or if somebody asks me, “What should I do? What should I start with?” I always give one easy little habit to start with is drink a big glass of water first thing in the morning. Most people drink a big cup of coffee first thing in the morning. You can still have your coffee, but maybe you put your glass of water right next to the coffee pot, so when you get up in the morning, you’re triggered immediately, “Okay. I got to drink my glass of water and then I’m going to have my coffee.” Again, just another example of habit stacking, it makes it easier, because you’re already going to do one of those automatic things and now you’re going to add that intentional thing with it.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely.

Micheala Barsotti:

The next one, this one plays in my head all the time especially because I, for a long time, you guys probably know, I talk about it, but I definitely battled with the all or nothing mentality. So if I fell off a little bit, I really fell off. This one is never missing a habit two days in a row. And this is another one that I got from Atomic Habits but James Clear talks about, you’re going to have days where the habit doesn’t get done or things happen. We’re not robots. We’re going to have those moments, but we never miss a habit two days in a row. When you miss a habit two days in a row, that’s a start of a new habit. When I heard that, like letting it sink in, it’s like, “Oh, dang.”

Paul Salter:

Right.

Micheala Barsotti:

It’s so good. Just keeping that top of mind it’s like, we’re going to have moments where we kind of stray off path. It’s bound to happen and you actually need to accept that, that’s going to happen. It doesn’t not happen for anybody. Once you can acknowledge that, that is part of the process, but just making sure that you always take those opportunities to learn from them. Let’s say you did miss your habit for whatever reason, how can you be better tomorrow? Going back to the 1% better, there’s your perfect example to show yourself that you are in control and you can execute.

Paul Salter:

I don’t miss twice. Like there is your mantra, your postage bulletin board material, if you will. Think of it like this too, also, you’re one opportunity away from getting right back on track. Whether it’s missing a meal or a meal prep or a workout or a reading session, a meditation session, like there’s going to be another opportunity. You’re only one away from getting right back on track with that habit so make it happen.

Micheala Barsotti:

For sure. Number six, celebrating success no matter how small it is. We are so big with celebrating success and wins and just acknowledging them in The 5%, whether it be the community or the fundamentals. Paul, I’m handing this one to you, but talk about the importance of celebrating your wins.

Paul Salter:

This is one of my favorite ones and really, I was made aware of this from the book Tiny Habits by Dr. BJ Fogg. One of my most favorite books, the most recommended books of all time. The merit here in celebrating your win is you want to really recreate an atmosphere that mimics a much larger celebration. So you can capitalize on the rush of dopamine experience in your brain, which is that feel-good neurotransmitter we talked about because the more an action or a decision elicits the production of dopamine, the more your brain seeks out doing that behavior again or making that decision. And the way that Dr. Fogg describes it in his book is, you want to celebrate the tiniest of wins as if you have just received a job offer for your dream job, or you just received a job offer for your first job ever.

I’ve shared this example before. I still remember exactly where I was when I got my first official job offer back in 2014, sitting in the parking lot at a gym at six something in the morning in Michigan during my dietetic internship. I remember just doing a big fist pump motion and saying, “Yes!” And utilizing that framework, that memory. Maybe you don’t have a memory of how you responded to your first job, but maybe you know how you would respond to accepting an offer for your dream job. You want to take however you would physiologically respond, emotionally respond and replicate that every single time you can find success, a piece of progress, a win or a victory when it comes to celebrating something that you have done that is in line with your habit formation.

Because again, you create that flooding of dopamine and that environment alone, your brain craves that. So it’s going to start some rewiring neuroplasticity at its finest, to encourage you to seek out that behavior more and more often, which, by the way, reinforces your goal of doing that habit more often, the habit six, and it’s just a win, win, win.

Micheala Barsotti:

Well, and too, when we talk about getting 1% better every day and doing the little things every single day, that means that our progress is not going to always be super noticeable, or the changes that are being made throughout our journey doesn’t mean that we’re not creating positive change, but sometimes it’s going to be really small. You’re not going to always notice it, so being able to stop and reflect on what are the positives that I have right now that I can celebrate, even if I don’t see any changes yet, I’ve been executing on drinking water before my coffee for the past eight days, and I have not done that in months. Like, that’s a win to celebrate and that’s your internal motivation to keep you going and to keep you moving forward.

You did a really great job, Paul, explaining because I think the next one kind of goes hand in hand with that, but our emotions create our habits. Just as Paul said. But BJ Fogg says, “People change best by feeling good, not bad.” We have to remember that when we have these little positive changes that are occurring over time, we start to feel really good because we’re doing something, we’re executing. Going back to my example of setting these big lofty goals that we can’t always commit to or follow through on, what does that do to our confidence? What does that do the next time you go to attempt that habit? It’s like your confidence is already tanked and you’re like, “Well, I couldn’t do it last time.” Like you’re in this mental state that it’s not positive and it’s not pushing you forward, so we want to think about like setting ourselves up to feel good.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. And I think gaining clarity on the emotional state or the collective set of feelings you want as your outcome of forming a new habit is incredibly important, because if you know what emotional state or feelings you are craving, not only is that going to help to appropriately align your actions. Boom, how about that for alliteration? But more importantly, it’s going to reinforce the positive emotions because that’s what you’re seeking is the good behavior change, the good feelings and it’s going to make it easier to celebrate the tiny wins, which has that nice reinforcement and perpetual cycle of reinforcement to keep you continuing to do set habit you have sought out to commit to doing.

Micheala Barsotti:

Again, really is very simple and I’m sure you guys are probably shaking your head like, “uh-huh” but we can’t hear this stuff enough because it’s just so important. It really is those little things. If you can take anything away from this episode, it’s taking a step back and just holding in on one habit at a time. Number eight, we’re almost there. We have two more left and number eight is all about the identity and stepping into the person that you want to become. I kind of said it in the beginning there, but what you repeatedly do or spend time thinking about and doing, it forms the person that you are and the things that you believe and the person that you portray.

If we think about, I want to be a runner, this is the most common example. I think James Clear uses this in his book. But if you want to be a runner, well, what do runners do? They run, right? So start running every single day and guess what? You are a runner and you are building up your confidence and you’re building that habit. And the only person that defines what a runner actually is, is you. It doesn’t matter if you run for 60 seconds every single day or you run five miles. If you run every day, you’re a runner.

Paul Salter:

I love that. One of the most powerful questions I ask myself probably a year, 18 months ago at this point in my life, and I continue to ask myself regularly and highly encourage everybody listening to is, who do I need to become to accomplish this? Basically, like if you want to be a runner or let’s speak in the most universally accepted and relatable currency, money. Who do you need to become to earn X amount of dollars? Like, what is someone who has already achieved the goal you are looking for, what does their identity consist of? What does that person think? How does that person speak to themselves, speak to others? What do those habits of that person look like? If you can gain a lot of clarity on this new future you, that’s going to help you step more seamlessly into the next best version of yourself.

Micheala Barsotti:

Yep. So good. Last one. Well, I think they’re all so important so I can’t say this is most important, but this is up there, but you need to be patient and be consistent. If we’re talking about getting 1% better every day, we already said it. You’re not going to necessarily see those big changes, but we have to remember that when we find a pace that we can sustain, we’re going to be more consistent at it. And it’s going to take time, the slower that we go, the less aggressive approach we take to changing our habits, chances are it’s going to be more sustainable long term. We’re going to be to do it. We’re going to have more success long term. It’s kind of like putting that, I always say like, your short term plan or success on the back burner for the long term gains, because taking that slow and steady approach really is the way to go.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. I’ll add too, like just kind of in line with the patience and the consistency is, take the pressure off yourself. You don’t get to finely label an action done repeatedly as a habit when you do it perfectly and never miss a beat. I can confidently tell you, I have a habit of working out five days per week. Sometimes I work out six days. Sometimes I work out three days. Life happens, but I have a habit of consistently working out and that is my label, that I don’t need to take it deeper and specify X number of days in workouts and duration and types of this. Like I can keep it big picture on the surface and make sure I’m not tied down to overcommit myself to too much that depletes energy or is just so much that it really sets me up for failure. Just remember too, like you don’t have to put all this pressure on yourself for perfection. It really just comes down to consistency and patience will really help you solidify the consistency.

Micheala Barsotti:

Boom. That’s good. Awesome. I feel like we covered a lot. That was pretty good. Just to kind of recap all of them here, number one is to start small. Number two is increasing your habit in small ways over time. And as you build up those habits, we start breaking them down into chunks. Number four, habit stacking. Number five, never miss twice. Number six, celebrating your success no matter how small it is and then remembering that emotions create our habits. Number eight is stepping into the person you want to become, that identity shift, and then the last one be patient, consistent. Give yourself some grace.

Paul Salter:

Absolutely. These are so fantastic. Just even preparing for this episode and now talking through it, gives me quite a few reminders to put back and implement into my own practices, but we can’t recommend enough. Some of the books we mentioned, Atomic Habits by James Clear, Tiny Habits by Dr. BJ Fogg and then The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. And there are many, many others out there, but those are three foundational books on habit formation and deconstruction that we can’t recommend enough.

Micheala Barsotti:

The last thing I want to say here is just that, especially when approaching your health and fitness, there is no end destination. These habits that you do to get you to this goal are the habits that you need to continue to do to maintain your goal. Going back to the millionaire scenario, you can work your butt off and become a millionaire, but if your habits start to drop off and you’re not saving anymore, then you’re going to, well, you’re probably going to become poor. Same thing with living a healthy lifestyle. If you do all the things you need to, you have great success, you lose weight, you get to a place you’re so happy, but then you just stop doing all those habits, what’s going to happen? You’re going to end up back at square one.

We have to remember that the steps that we take every single day, it’s so crucial that we are going slow and steady because that is what’s going to be sustainable long term. That’s what’s going to allow us to enjoy the process and just not be miserable and feeling like we’re fighting tooth and nail every day to get things done.

Well, I hope you guys really enjoyed today’s episode. Thank you so much for listening in. If you found this discussion valuable, we would so appreciate it if you shared it with somebody who would also find it helpful, and if you have not already, it would so much to us if you left us a genuine review and rating on Apple podcast or wherever it is that you are listening to this. Other than that, we will see you soon.

Paul Salter:

Take care guys.