Mind the Habit

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence is not an act, but a habit.

Note: this famous quote, attributed to the Greek philosopher Aristotle, was actually written by Will Durant in his 1926 book “The story of Philosophy”.

Having been working on my habits for a while now, paying attention to what experts say about them, and analysing my experiences and my environment I started asking myself a few questions, such as: “Are Habits and Routines the same thing?”

In Italian, the word habit (IT: abitudine) is often given a negative meaning, because we frequently use it when we are talking about bad habits, such as smoking, drinking, bing watching TV, eating junk food….. We instead give a more positive meaning to the word routine (IT: routine). For example we say that we have the routine of exercising in the morning, or of going for a walk after dinner, or of taking a cold plunge with friends in the river every Saturday morning (that’s me! 😁)….

Looking into it I have found the following:

Habits are automatic behaviours that require minimal conscious thought or effort to be performed. Up to 70% of our waking behaviours are habits.

Habits form because the brain is always trying to save effort.

Our nervous system learns the habit, either consciously or unconsciously, thanks to neuroplasticity: new connections, which form between neurons. Thanks to these neurological patterns the behaviour becomes more automatic, saving brain energy, which becomes available for learning new skills.

The start of a repetitive behaviour requires conscious thought and intention, but the goal of building it into a habit is to make it more automatic and part of your daily, or weekly, routine. The process of habit formation can vary from person to person and depends on factors like motivation, consistency, and the specific habit in question.

When we talk about habits we usually refer to actions or behaviours, like working out, meditating, journaling, driving, smoking, eating sweets.

Routines are a series of actions or tasks performed in a specific order and at a specific time of the day, with regularity. They can involve multiple habits but also include other activities such as work tasks, chores, sport….

Conscious thought and intention are involved into the routine process, although some actions may become automatic (habits).

Take my morning routine, for example, which unfolds in this order:

• Wake up at 5:30

• Maui Habit

• Drink a glass of water

• Meditation

• Exercise

• Journaling

• Reading

• Cold shower

Obviously it started as conscious choices. With time and repetition, these actions became integrated into a routine that I’ve been practicing consistently for over two years. During this time, these actions may have transitioned from conscious efforts to more automatic behaviours, like habits.

It’s important to note that willpower and intention can still play a role in maintaining routines, especially when you don’t feel like doing them, even when certain components have become habitual. Here I find particularly important to GO SMALL!

Sometimes I don’t feel like exercising after meditation and to stick to my routine I go small: instead of doing a work-out made by push-ups, plank, squats, lunges and abs I do only one of those, even with fewer reps than those I usually do. That’s enough to make me tick off my mental box which says: “GREAT! I’ve done my morning exercise, I am someone who wants to keep fit!”

I don’t feel guilty, neither I consider my work-out a failure, because I have an identity-based habit attitude, which means that I have the long-term goal of getting fit and not the short term one of doing a certain number of reps.

If instead my habits were immediate goal-based habits, I would expect a specific outcome, each and every time I do them. Therefore I would not be pleased with myself if I didn’t stick to the scheduled work-out.

The distinction between habits and routines isn’t always so clear and the two can overlap.

HABITS vs ROUTINES…. which one wins? The only winner is YOU!

It doesn’t really matter if the task/behaviour we perform falls into one definition or another, the important thing is to perform it….. as long as it is a GOOD one!

Yes! Because habits can be good or bad. But we are here to build good ones and to break bad ones… aren’t we?

Recently I was listening to a podcast where the guest was Ryan Holiday who said something that made me deeply reflect. He said that routines are very important for the stoic, as long as they do not become a religion, which will give way to fragility.

That reminded me of progress over perfection!

I leave you with a mantra to beat procrastination:

You miss 100% of the shots you never take

Wayne Gretzky (hockey player)

Next we are going to see how to build habits, analysing what the habit loop is.