The magic of tiny habits

[bobueland]

Just now, I've watched a Tedx video on youTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdKUJxjn-R8, by BJ Fogg.

I've seen this idea in books like Mini Habits, The Slight Edge and some others. I've even discovered that method for myself one day when I was washing dishes (see my post called "The art of doing the dishes").

So I've seen this method, but what I was not aware of was the importance of the trigger, which Fogg explains at the end of his talk. The idea is to use an existing behavior to trigger a new behavior. So if you want to take a little walk two times a day you pick up some existing behavior that happens two times a day. For example "After lunch and dinner, I will walk for 2 minutes". Or one example by Fogg "After I pee, I will make two push ups".

It is important that the I will ... is TINY. The reason for choosing it TINY is explained in the two books above which I've mentioned. BTW these two books are fantastic and if you haven't read them, do yourself a service and read them.

But the explanation of how to use triggers, is best described by mr Fogg.

[lit_addict]

Great idea, bubueland! Tiny habits provoke bigger changes, because it's not too hard to keep doing tiny things regularly.

I support BJ Fogg with his saying "practice changes your own behavior". It's true enough.

Speaking of writing, many writers have their own writing habits. Some of them were even a little bit weird, but others were pretty common.

Jack London wrote 1000 words every single day.

Resource: https://unplag.com/blog/famous-writers-and-their-weird-writing-habits

Sounds like not a tiny habit, isn't it? But it's only 2 pages (for a single spaced page) or 4 pages (for a double spaced page). But in one year it would be... 1000*30*12 = 360,000 words! Or 2*30*12=720 single spaced pages or 4*30*12=1,440 double spaced pages! Sounds like someone could write 1 or 2 books a year just writing 1,000 words every single day.

So the magic of tiny habits is really incredible.