Atomic Habits

People who make a specific plan for when and where they will act are more likely to follow through. Write it as an implementation intention: I will [behaviour] at [time] in [location]. Want to drink more water? Put a bottle on your desk.

• Habits Scorecard. List what you already do in a day, so the habits running on autopilot become visible.
• Implementation intention. Name the time and the place in advance, so the moment does the deciding.
• Habit stacking. After [current habit], I will [new habit].
• Environment design. Put the cue where you cannot miss it. Score your room below

Remove the cue. In Clear’s reading of the research, the people who seem most disciplined are often the ones who spend the least time in tempting situations. Leave the phone in another room; keep the biscuits out of sight.

• Reduce exposure. Take the cues for the habit out of your surroundings.

Pair an action you want to do with an action you need to do, which Clear calls temptation bundling: only listen to your favourite podcast while exercising. Or join a culture where the behaviour you want is the normal behaviour.

• Temptation bundling. Only let yourself have the thing you want while doing the thing you need to.
• Join the right culture. Spend time with people for whom your habit is already normal.
• Motivation ritual. Do something you enjoy just before the hard habit, until one starts to cue the other.

Reframe it. Write down what you gain by avoiding the habit, until it looks like a cost rather than a treat.

• Reframe your mind-set. Put the benefits of avoiding it where you will see them.

Reduce friction. The effort a habit takes decides how likely you are to do it. Scale down the habit until it takes less than two minutes, and set it up in advance: lay your workout clothes out the night before.

• Reduce friction. Cut the steps between you and the good habit.
• Prime the environment. Set things up the night before, so the next action is already waiting.
• Master the decisive moment. A few small choices each day decide what the next hour looks like.
• Two-Minute Rule. Shrink the habit until starting takes less than two minutes. Try it below
• Automate. Make a one-time choice that keeps working: an automatic transfer, an unsubscribe, a smaller plate.

Add steps. Unplug the TV after each use; log out of the site after every session. A commitment device goes further: decide now, while you are calm, what you will be able to do later.

• Increase friction. Put more steps between you and the habit.
• Commitment device. Limit tomorrow’s choices today.

What is rewarded is repeated. Give the habit an immediate reward, or track it on paper and cross off each day you keep it, so the progress is visible the moment it happens.

• Reinforcement. Give yourself something small and immediate the moment it’s done.
• Make doing nothing enjoyable. When the habit is a thing you skip, make the skipping visible: move the money you didn’t spend into an account named after it.
• Habit tracker. Mark each day you keep it; the chain becomes its own reward. Make one below
• Never miss twice. Miss a day, then make the next one count. See the ballot above

Make the cost immediate. Ask an accountability partner to watch, or write a habit contract, sign it and share it, so breaking it costs you something today rather than someday.

• Accountability partner. Someone who knows, and will ask.
• Habit contract. A written, signed, shared cost for breaking it.