100 Things Every Presenter Needs to Know About People

37. Forming A Habit Takes a Long Time and Requires Small Steps

When you wake up in the morning, you brush your teeth, then check your iPhone and email, then take a shower, and then get dressed (or whatever your particular pattern is). You do this every day. It’s a habit. Why are you motivated to do these same tasks every day? What did it take for these activities to become a habit? What would it take to change the habit to something else?

Philippa Lally (2010) recently studied the “how” and “how long” of forming habits. She had people choose an eating, drinking, or activity behavior to carry out every day for 12 weeks. In addition, the participants had to go online and complete a habit index each day to record whether or not they had carried ...