If you’re like most people right now, you’re reaching for your phone, checking and reading the news at every available chance. And in doing so, you might have noticed that rarely does more information make you feel better.
One habit worth experimenting with during these tough, unprecedented times, is reevaluating any negative Action Prompts in your life, and then building new, positive behaviors off the back of them.
“An Action Prompt,” writes BJ Fogg in his book Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything, is a behavior you already do that can remind you to do a new habit you want to cultivate.”
For instance, one habit I’m currently building is writing down three things I’m grateful for every day. However, rather than finding where it fits naturally into my life, as Fogg suggests, I’m challenging myself to do it immediately after a behavior that’s likely to affect my mood: reading the news.
Now, after I check the news, be it morning, noon, or night, I write down three things I’m grateful for. [2] These things might be an old relationship that helped a lot. Or, an opportunity I have today, something great that happened yesterday, or something simple near me. [3]
If you feel lousy after reading the news, forget trying to break the habit; that requires more effort. Instead, leverage it as an anchor for a habit you’re trying to build but have been putting off. It might be the best decision you make all year.
Footnotes
[1] The Tetris Effect is an idea from Shawn Anchor’s brilliant book, The Happiness Advantage. This principle involves retraining our brains to focus on the good things in our lives.
[2] Use the following implementation intention when building a new habit: After I [ANCHOR], I will [NEW HABIT].
[3] I got my gratitude prompts from Tim Ferriss’s article, “The Magic of Mindfulness: Complain Less, Appreciate More, and Live a Better Life.”
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