How to build any habits

I started my fitness journey in 2018, at the time I was 90kg, and now I weigh 70kg. Building a habit of working out has been the best decision of my life. I learned a lot about habit building in the process and applied this learning to other areas of my life. In this post, I want to share my learnings and talk about how you can apply them to your own life.

Now, with so many books out there about how to build habits, it feels like rocket science when it is not. Building a new habit is very simple.

You see, Most advice out there on building habits talks about all the tips and tricks like setting a routine, setting up reminders. While these tips and tricks can help, they will not work if you don’t approach the habit in the right manner.

You must have a task in mind that you want to build a habit of, like going to the gym, studying, or learning to dance, but you have a high chance of failing if you don’t remember these three important points…

1. The habit has to feel very important

“If I don’t do this, then my life is worthless.” That was how I actually felt when I started my fitness journey. I don’t feel the same way anymore, but at the time, it got me to do what I wanted to. I know it sounds extreme, and you obviously don’t have to have that kind of feeling.

What I am saying is the habit has to feel completely non-optional to you. That is what it takes to start anything hard or new.

The importance of something in your life can keep changing, and you have to change your habits according to that. For example, when you are obese, the importance of fitness in your life is very high compared to when you become fit or have other priorities to take care of.

2. The task has to be in your comfort zone (or almost feel easy)

Back in 2018, when I decided I wanted to be fit, I was very skeptical of joining a gym and hiring a trainer because I saw people around me who did that, but it did not last long; they went to the gym for a week and then stopped.

I decided to challenge myself to work out at home for at least 6 months. If I can’t work out for 30 minutes at home every day, then there is no point in joining a gym and paying for it. Consistency felt more important than the goal.

Undercommit and Overdeliver

That is the rule I like to live by. It’s very easy to get motivated one day and make a ridiculous commitment and not be able to do it after a couple of days.

Start small, and as you start feeling more and more comfortable with the task, you can slowly increase the difficulty level.

3. Lower your expectations

If I had achieved my fitness goal in a matter of 3 months, then I wouldn’t have stayed with it for long and wouldn’t have the physique that I have today.

One of the best things in my fitness journey was that it took me 5 YEARS to achieve the goal I wanted to. In 2018, when I was 90kg, my goal was to get to 75kg, but for the first three years, my weight was hovering between 85kg to 90kg. I reached 75kg in 2023. It is obvious that I wasn’t doing everything right, but I never stopped working out.

Working out for three years without getting any results, while it seems demotivating, it allowed fitness to become a strong part of my identity. After years of working out, I fell in love with it, which made me stick to it for longer.

Once a habit is a part of your identity, then it’s just a matter of increasing the intensity. So you can lower your expectations for some time, just to keep showing up.

3. Track your habits

“You don’t improve at what you don’t track.”

It doesn’t matter how dedicated you are to building a habit or achieving your goal; gamifying the habit will increase the stakes each day.

Tracking your workouts will make you want to improve your workout each session.

If you have been studying for 68 days straight, you wouldn’t want to miss the next session, because you will lose your streak.

Have some self-compassion

The whole point of building a habit is to achieve something over a long period of time. That means it is completely okay if you miss a couple of days; that is the reason you are building a habit, so that you still come back the next day and do it. Doing one task every day, all year round, is not just a habit;analyze it’s like being a machine, which is not really an ideal case; you might end up offending close ones or sacrificing higher priority demands of your time.

It is very easy to start beating yourself up when you miss a day, but beating yourself up is actually counterproductive to your goals. To build a habit successfully, you need more positive emotions relating to the habit and fewer negative emotions, but by beating yourself up, you are just increasing the negative emotions that are associated with that task and that habit. Which will increase the friction you will feel when you think of doing the task next time.

When you miss a day, accept that you missed it and it’s completely okay, and analyze why you weren’t able to do it.

Is the task out of your comfort zone?

Were you distracted?

Try finding the problem and the solution to it. If it is something out of your control, then you don’t have to worry about it and just show up the next day.

It is important to cut the circuit of self-loathing.

That’s it. Thanks for reading, I hope you got something out of it!