3 easy ways to re-wire your brain to stop a bad habit
These are real life situations that zap your brain
When my kid was younger, like 8 years old, every time I put the fries in his lap for him to eat, I would simultaneously pickup two fries and pop out in my mouth.
That’s without thinking.
That’s how powerful habit is, it’s automatic.
For the past months, I tried to re-wire my brain to not automatically do a bad habit. If my brain is a printed circuit board, you know those green thing inside an electronic box, I would imagine rewiring would be zapping a circuit to cut the flow of signal
I failed some and succeeded at some. It can be done.
To be honest, my biggest wins are positive habits that are easy to do. For example, from the very start of 2021, I didn’t miss saying “Thank you”, every morning, before I step on the floor.
Or stretch every time the coffee is brewing (I do yoga poses and massage my muscles using foam rollers).
Or meditated for 5 minutes every morning (my meditation app says 455 days uninterrupted, and I started before the pandemic).
Or read my Bible app (255 days uninterrupted and counting).
Those are good habits though, but how about bad habits?
This is where it becomes doozy. Because when I apply app trackers and everything, I failed. What I mean is that I can have a long streak but then stop.
What do I mean? Here’s the real world example: overeating. I tried a calorie tracker at the start of this year, and I lost 4 pounds.
But in second quarter of this year, the weight was gaining back, so I have to rewire my brain to lose those pounds again. Here’s how I did it.
Stack Your Small Wins
When you try to change a bad habit like me, on not over-eating, I stack my small wins. What I mean by that is that our brain needs positive feedback in order to be on track.
The tracking app is helpful. Small wins like not going over budget in your calorie counting will be helpful to continue. But this is not perfect strategy, because you will fail to log sooner or later, so here’s what to do next.
Don’t Negotiate With Yourself
Every time I am in a situation of eating food that are calorie dense like ice cream or chocolate, I don’t negotiate with myself that I can only have one scoop or just one. This are also considered small wins, but specifically negotiating with one self.
If I snooze my alarm, then I lost already (no small win) and I negotiated myself.
Optimize your environment
I always catch myself opening the fridge for food without thinking, then I also automatically grab a food.
So what I did was I get rid of junk foods and high calorie food. In this case, my environment is clean of the heavy calorie food.
I try not to negotiate with my self if I can
The second half this year will determine how my goal will flow, but I know, I will fail again. So here’s a bonus: You know you will have failures, but the secret is to be persistent, and not make the small wrongdoings a permanent failure.
