10 Simple Steps To Create Daily Habits For Better Wellbeing
Are you struggling to create a healthier lifestyle for yourself? Perhaps you don’t know where to begin? Or maybe, you’re one of thousands of individuals that struggle with staying committed to a habit that could better their mind and well-being. Or, could it be that you think that your lifestyle is too busy to justify taking these moments for yourself? Unfortunately, many of these reasons are simply excuses.
These excuses often act as a roadblock for you on your path to start living a healthier (and happier!) lifestyle. Instead of putting off your lifestyle goals, consider these simple steps to create healthy habits.
What are Healthy Habits?
Daily habits can come from a variety of sources. Everyone will have a varying level of what they consider ‘healthy’ and it’s important that these habits align with your needs and goals. The expectation to live a healthy lifestyle often comes with an overwhelming amount of pressure to overhaul every part of your life. However, the most successful habits will be those that you are able to integrate into your lifestyle to improve the quality of both your health and mind. (So no, not all healthy changes have to involve diet and exercise. In fact, far more should be focused on whole body wellness.)
A list of healthy habits to start could include:
Eating more whole foods
Incorporating a workout routine into your schedule
Waking up earlier
Trying a new workout class
Drinking more water
Starting a journal
Incorporating self-care into your daily routine
Making time for meditation
Starting the day without screen time
Taking time to enjoy your food
Getting outside
Including more spontaneity
Standing up from your desk at work
Taking mental breaks throughout the day
Going to sleep earlier
As you can see, a list of daily habits is nearly endless. Each item on this list could be beneficial in some way to your health and wellbeing and can have a positive effect on your overall wellness.
How Many Days Does It Take to Form a Habit?
Unfortunately, there is no universal timeline for creating a habit, as it is unique to each individual. However, you might have heard of the 21 Day Habit Theory. This theory, originally created by plastic surgeon Dr. Maxwell Maltz in the 1950s, suggested that it took the patient an average of 21 days to be able to identify the changes from the procedures in themselves. However, Maltz didn’t actually find this to be true, but the idea caught on and was spread quickly. Studies have since shown that it can take anywhere from 18 to 254 days to create a new habit. Instead of looking for the “quick fix,” consider taking action with changes to help your habit stick.
How Long to Create a Habit Successfully?
While how long it takes to build a habit can vary widely by person, there are a few steps that you can take to help you be successful. If you want to form a new habit, you have to make it a priority!
Don’t Change Everything at Once
Want to make those habits last? Don’t try to change everything at once! Instead, focus on one thing that you can do each day to change your lifestyle for the better. If you focus on changing a single part of your day, you are much more likely to focus on the task at hand. Conversely, changing too many things may make you feel overwhelmed or stressed, causing you to revert back to the safety of your old ways.
Avoid the Temptation
For those looking to change their routine, one of the simplest ways to do so is to remove the temptation entirely. Want to avoid eating processed snacks? Remove them from your pantry. If the specific craving is less readily available, you will be less likely to reach for it. Want to avoid looking at your phone first thing in the morning? Sleep with it in the bathroom or another room in your house—out of arms’ reach.
Commit To 21 Days
Even though changing a habit may take longer than 21 days, commit to a new habit for these three weeks. This allows you to have enough time to make it a part of your daily life, while still breaking the change into a manageable size. You might be surprised at how quickly those days go by!
Create An Accountability System
Want to make the habit last? Tell your friends and family about the change that you are making in your lifestyle. These connections will not only be supportive, but will be accountability partners for you when you need a little extra assistance. Knowing that someone is supporting you means that you’ll be less likely to quit, knowing that you are not only quitting on yourself, but them as well.
Often, we aren’t trying to simply break bad habits—but instead, create new ones. Accountability partners can be a great tool to encourage you to start something for your wellness together, while joining in with someone else. You can share what you are both learning about yourselves or the changes that you have seen this new inclusion make in your daily lives. You might even learn something from them that you wouldn’t have seen yourself!
Another easy tip to form a new habit is by keeping a journal dedicated to your progress. This allows you to constantly remind yourself that you are working towards a goal and you can see each individual day and the changes that you are making. You can address the good days and learn from the bad—and create a more intimate look into your mind and wellbeing.
If you need a larger reminder, try placing a calendar on your fridge, desk, or anywhere that you will see it daily. If you are committing to a 30-day challenge, mark each day on the calendar off when you hit your new lifestyle goal. Add these new habits into a work planner, or schedule them onto your phone to remind you of your committal to this new routine.
Replace a Bad Habit with a Good Habit
One of the reasons that bad habits are hardest to break is the reward system that we create when we experience joy. The brain releases the chemical dopamine, which provides the stimulus for happiness. We continually go back to bad habits because we crave this release. Therefore, switching a bad habit for a good habit can produce the same results, signaling to the brain that this new habit is also enjoyable. By swapping out these habits, you’ll also be less likely to crave or miss the bad, in favor of the good.
Reward Yourself
While we believe that you should never restrict yourself or need to earn a reward, consider the simple swap above. Much like the swap in dopamine response, rewarding yourself can have a positive effect on making a habit stick.
Consider dog training. When a dog is taught simple commands, such as sit or stay, a trainer will reinforce the good behavior with treats. This reward creates a positive consequence for the dog’s actions. Should the dog not perform the expected command, it no longer receives the reward. As the command is performed repeatedly, the dog begins to associate the learned behavior with a reward. This creates positive reinforcement for the dog and creates a lasting reaction.
While we might not want to consider ourselves akin to a dog, the same version of training can be applied to humans. By rewarding ourselves by consistently sticking with a habit, we unconsciously associate this behavior with the reward that we set for ourselves. This, again, provides the dopamine response and we continue to seek out this pleasurable experience. So when looking to start a new habit and stick with it, remember to reward yourself for any small positive steps that you are making so that you can form long lasting commitments.
But, the same can be true for the reverse. Punishing yourself for a less than successful day—and trust us, we all have them—only stands to wreak havoc on our minds and mental health. Bad days happen—how we learn from these days is what matters most.
10 Steps to Create Healthy Habits
If you seek to turn these healthy habits into an entire lifestyle change, how can you have the most success? These ten steps may provide the necessary tools to start establishing habits to a healthier lifestyle.
Set realistic expectations
As discussed above, one of the best ways to create lasting lifestyle changes is to focus on one task at a time. Create a list of healthy habits for yourself that you want to accomplish. This could be over the course of weeks, months, or years.
Perhaps you have been wanting to spend more time reading each month. It would be unrealistic to set a goal of finishing a book in a day. Not only will you be disappointed in yourself, but you’ll be more likely to give up on adding more reading time into your day.
Instead, look at your goal objectively and set a realistic expectation for yourself. This allows you to not only work towards the goal in a measured way, but create an atmosphere that feels both attainable and motivating.
Ask yourself Why
The process of changing your routine can take on a variety of forms. However, one way in which you can create a happier, healthier you is by not simply setting a goal, but asking yourself why. This deeper, internal look is a pivotal way to identify the goals that you want to set for yourself.
For example, if your goal is to develop a better relationship with food, what is the motivator? Do you have gastrointestinal issues that you’re looking into? Do you want to change bad eating habits?
Let’s look even deeper. Are your wanting to break yourself away from society’s toxic diet culture? Is it to be able to enjoy your food? To have more self-compassion? To embrace body neutrality? While the main goal might take on a different shape, it’s important to understand what is the driving force behind why you want to start living a healthier lifestyle. Identifying these goals will also cause you to create a deeper connection with the new lifestyle changes and prevent you from prematurely quitting from building good habits.
Try this: Set yourself a mantra that connects you with this deeper why. When you find yourself struggling, repeat this intention to yourself to refocus and center yourself on your new habit.
Create a roadmap to success
So you want to start making small changes to improve your mental health. How will you do that? What steps will you take to change your lifestyle? One of the best ways is to start to plan. There is an old saying, “Failing to plan is planning to fail.”
This can be applied just as easily to creating good lifestyle habits. Break your goal into attainable, tangible pieces that you can execute. If you want to start incorporating more time for self-care, then start by creating a list of your favorite ways to decompress and relax (or simply the things that bring you joy). From there, identify the days that you might need extra time set aside for yourself—such as a long work day or an extra busy day filled with engagements.
Create a weekly schedule to set aside some me-time for yourself, just like you would for a work meeting or appointment. These simple steps will help you exponentially with your goal and continue to provide you with the tools necessary to find success.
Start the day with a solid morning
How important is routine? In many ways, starting your day with a healthy morning routine may be one of the most crucial parts of forming a new habit. We won’t argue that there is any one specific best way to start the day—in fact, for some, a scheduled morning might be the opposite of what they need. However, if you are someone who finds this structure to be beneficial, we would encourage you to formulate your ideal routine the night before. When preparing for the next day, ask yourself:
What time are you going to set your alarm?
Am I waking up at a time that allows me to get the nightly sleep I need?
Will you have enough time for breakfast?
Will you workout in the morning or do you prefer to wait until the evening?
Do I have breakfast prepared?
Do I have time to get ready without feeling rushed?
Will you take time to meditate? Journal? Read?
What can I do to better prepare for a successful day?
While you don’t have to answer each of these questions, these questions are just thought starters to starting a solid daily morning routine. As with any of the habits discussed above, a good morning routine can be established in much the same way as any habit. Start slow by adding in one daily item, such as setting your alarm earlier or prepping a quick breakfast the night before. Slowly expand upon this morning routine by adding in more healthy habits until you reach the ideal way to start each day.
Focus on what you can do, not on what you can’t
Often, when we think of what habits to form, we think in terms of what we can’t do versus what we can do. If your goal is making eating better for your body, don’t focus on what you can’t eat. This creates not only restrictions, but an emphasis on “good” and “bad.” Maintaining a healthy lifestyle also means creating a healthy mindset.
Instead of focusing on the positive, such as the benefit of the new foods you’re adding to your diet, you fixate on the negative, further creating a craving, desire, or negative association with food. Another old saying—the grass is always greener on the other side—digs into the fact that we always yearn for what we cannot have. If you want to continue to build good habits, shift your attention to the positive and leave the past behind.
““You aren’t always successful; you can’t always fail. Know that you are always a work in progress and as you move on the continuum, you are doing so with your best. “”
There is No “all or nothing”
Just like there is no “good” or “bad” food, there is no “all or nothing” when establishing a lifestyle change. Everything exists on a continuum. At one end, you have everything that is purely bad and on the other, purely good. But because of this continuum, there is no black and white area. There is only grey.
To return to the food example, is there any one food that is purely bad? Sure, a candy bar may not be filled with “good” nutrients, but does it satisfy your hunger? Does a candy bar not still provide carbohydrates, protein, or fat to your diet? Does it provide a sense of nostalgia or happiness? Satisfaction?
Any one of these things could bring a candy bar up from the level of “purely bad.” The same would be true about the opposite end of this continuum. To reach the upper bounds of what is considered good, you would have to reach perfection. Is anything truly perfect? No. Therefore, it is impossible to have an “all or nothing” scenario because nothing is an absolute. You aren’t always successful; you can’t always fail. Know that you are always a work in progress and as you move on the continuum, you are doing so with your best.
Let go of perfection
Against our greater desire, no one is perfect. When making big changes, you will stumble. There will be times when things don’t go as planned. There will be times when you don’t follow the plan perfectly.
Sometimes life can be challenging, stressful, and frankly, a little uncontrollable. The important part of this is accepting the fact that you won’t always get it right because no one gets it right one hundred precent of the time. Let go of the desire to be perfect and instead, tell yourself that your effort is what matters.
Are you doing the best that you can? Does this one stumble completely deter you from reaching your goals? It’s important to remember that there are 365 days in a year. One day is a tiny blip on the radar of the greater year. If you didn’t have the best day, that’s okay. Don’t let one day derail your progress. Instead, identify your mistakes and attack it again the next day. Don’t let one mistake ruin everything.
““There will be times when you don’t follow the plan perfectly. Sometimes life can be challenging, stressful, and frankly, a little uncontrollable. The important part of this is accepting the fact that you won’t always get it right because no one gets it right one hundred precent of the time.””
Reward Yourself
While these may seem like simple tips towards healthier everyday living—both mentally and physically—remember to stop and reward yourself for your continuous efforts. Not only does this provide positive reinforcement for a job well done, it also helps your brain associate these new lifestyle changes as lasting habits.
When you are mapping out your path to achieving your goals, make sure to add in rewards for yourself at various points along the way. Don’t forget to include the small steps. These are just as important as the larger goals and help to keep you motivated along the way.
Self-care
Self-care practices are crucially important in any well-rounded healthy routine. Prioritizing your own time is not selfish. In fact, self-care can provide a needed mental health release from any stress and anxiety that happens in your daily life. Whether you prefer to take a long bubble bath, or read a new book, it’s important to schedule time to make yourself a priority and tend to not just your physical needs, but your emotional and mental needs as well.
Give Yourself Grace
Making changes in your life can be scary or stressful. You might not see an immediate change, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t working. Remember why you started on this journey to a better wellbeing. Focus on your why and the mantra or intention that you set for yourself. Know that not every day will be perfect but that is okay. The process is not instantaneous and might not happen as quickly as you planned. Don’t lose sight of your goals, let go of your perfectionist mindset, and give yourself grace knowing that you are a work in progress.