Subscribe To This Site
Behavior Modification: Tips for Changing Your Behavior and Building New HabitsLet's be honest with ourselves: behavior modification can be hard.  And, recent scientific discoveries by brain researchers reveal that our behavior and the brain chemistry underlying it are more changeable than we ever realized before. For as long as you are alive, the brain can make new connections and neural pathways. (For more on the exciting field of neuroplasticity, I recommend The Brain That Changes Itself, by Norman Doidge.) This page will discuss the powerful behavior modification approaches that can drastically increase your odds of success. I'll share some strategies and techniques that work for common behavior modification issues like losing weight, getting up earlier, implementing new habits, time management, and a range of other common issues many folks face. Quick note: If you are dealing with more psychologically-based issues like anxiety, depression, anger, or violence, I suggest you speak with a qualified mental health professional. They can drastically help your behavior modification efforts by providing support and expertise for your specific situation. Building New Habits In essence, the core of behavior modification lies in learning new habits. When you build new habits, you literally build new grooves and neural pathways in your brain. The more you perform a habit, the stronger the pathway. The bad news is that with bad habits, this works against you. But, the good news is that youcan indeed create new neural connections and thus create and strengthen new habits. Literally, you can train your habits to work for you. As the wonderful quotation goes: I am your constant companion. I am your greatest helper or heaviest burden. I will push you onward or drag you down to failure. I am completely at your command. Half of the things you do you might as well turn over to me and I will do them - quickly and correctly. I am easily managed - you must be firm with me. Show me exactly how you want something done and after a few lessons, I will do it automatically. I am the servant of great people, and alas, of all failures as well. Those who are great, I have made great. Those who are failures, I have made failures. I am not a machine though I work with the precision of a machine plus the intelligence of a person. You may run me for profit or run me for ruin - it makes no difference to me. Take me, train me, be firm with me, and I will place the world at your feet. Be easy with me and I will destroy you. Who am I? I am Habit. - Anonymous To give your behavior modification efforts the greatest likelihood of success and to establish long lasting positive habits, I recommend integrating techniques and methods from psychology, the world's wisdom traditions, and professional coaching. Here are a few of the most important. Clarify "Success" Before beginning your behavior modificationapproach, clarify your objectives. Seek to understand why this behavior modification is important to you. Ask yourself,
 If you are not clear about your desired outcome from the behavior modification, or if you do not care about achieving that outcome, chances are good you will not be successful. So take some time before beginning to clarify, write down, visualize, and literally feel exactly what you want to have happen. It is true that carrots and sticks are important for behavior modification. But, they are nothing compared to the fire within that will fuel your efforts. Write a New Story Thoughts often drive our behavior and emotions. Positive thoughts can build you up and make you confident; negative thoughts can lead you to spiral down and crash and burn. According to the Cognitive-Behavioral schools of psychology and one of its legends, Albert Ellis, founder of Rational Emotive Therapy,generally things follow the ABC process. A = activating event B = belief C = consequence Here's how this works Let's say the Activating Event is that someone frowns at us when walking by. If our Belief is "He must think I'm ugly," the Consequence would probably be feeling upset. If however, there were a different Belief - such as "He must be having a bad day" - then the Consequence would be different, probably that you'll go on about your business and think nothing more of it. The main idea here is that it's not what happens to us that makes us feel a certain way; it's the beliefs we hold that determine how we react to things. And this makes sense. We see it all the time: two people experience the same event and interpret it and react differently. So, the bottom line to all of this is that to change our outcomes weneed to change our beliefs, or as we shay on this site, "write a new story." To write a new story, think about your current story. For example, what inneffective beliefs do you hold? Look closely for them. They're insidious and frequently whisper in your ear. Here are some common ones:
Once you identify a negative story, you'll want to Name It, Claim It, and Reframe It. In essence, write a new story.  To explain a bit further, all these internal stories are merely storiesyou made up and tell yourself. So, acknowledge it's your story, and then craft a new one that will be effective in bringing good things into your life. We call this Personal Authorship. Here are examples of some positive stories which would drive positive behavior.
Change Your Behavior In addition to changing your thoughts, the other way to change your behavior is to . . .change your behavior. It sounds obvious, but I cannot overstate it: practice, practice, practice the new behavior to build the new muscles and new neural pathways. There's a saying in New Guinea that captures this: "You haven't learned it until it's in the muscle."  Practice, practice, practice for long-term behavior modification success. For example, if you're working on lowering your stress level, practice stress relief techniques frequently. The more you do them, the stronger the neural pathway becomes and the easier you will be able to use them in times of stress. Or, to take another example, if you're working on public speaking, practice in a small group and build your comfort. Then a bigger group and build your comfort. Then an even bigger group and build your comfort, and so on. As you're practicing, start small and then turn up the heat as you can. Your behavior modification should be a crescendo. If you try to make an absolute resolution, for example, "I haven't been to the gym in 2 years but I'm going every day next week," it probably won't happen. It might, but your habits will usually revolt against you. A better strategy is to build the new behavior into your life slowly and sustainably. Go for increasingly larger wins, but begin by realistically committing to what you will do. For example, with starting a meditation practice, start with 5 minutes a day. Then 7 minutes a day. Then 10 minutes a day. Then a 10 minute session in the morning and a 5 minute session in theafternoon. Over time, you build the habit - and the neural pathways - and the habit begins to work for you. Also, as you're practicing new behaviors, anticipate relapses. Relapses will occur and they happen spontaneously and without warning. They can come at any time, and with behavior change theyfrequently occur around months 2-3 and months 5-6. Often, people experience a relapse, think there's no hope, give up, and revert to old behaviors. DON'T DO IT. Instead, get up, dust yourself off, forgive yourself, and keepgoing. If you know relapses will occur, you can navigatesuccessfully through them and avoid letting a momentary bad decision ruin your behavior modification efforts. Body-Mind Practices Understanding the interplay between your body and your emotions, mind, and behaviors can drastically increase your chances of behavior modification success. To demonstrate what I mean, let's try an experiment:
We all know intuitively that our thoughts and emotions get conveyed in our body language. Well, the interesting part is doing the reverse: by shifting your body, you can shift your thoughts and emotions. Somatic psychologists and coaches work with people in this way toreprogram the way the body holds emotions, thoughts, and associations. For example, let's say whenever you talk with a certain person or even think about a certain person you become mad. Your jaw clenches. Your shoulders hunch forward. Your breathing becomes shallow. . . If you can become aware of the physical changes and catch yourself, then you can make changes physically. This begins to alter the entire body-mind system. In our example of anger at a certain person, if you catch yourself you can drop your shoulders back, relax your jaw, and take deep breaths to literally reprogram the way your body-mind experiences that person. You would begin by practicing this away from the person, and then progress to practicing it in his presence. Although these practices can seem difficult, they are actually quite intuitive to pick up once you get the hang of it. Two wonderful resources I recommend are:
Mindfulness I write about meditation frequently on thissite as a phenomenal practice that will accelerate your personal growth efforts in many domains. Not surprisingly, it is also helpful for behavior modification. To begin, meditation - and particularly mindfulness meditation - can train you to be a keen observer of yourself in the moment.  This in the moment awareness is important for making proactive choices required in behavior modification, as opposed to being led around by emotions and the discursive mind. For more on meditation, please visit my page on types of meditation. Structural Supports Above I mentioned the importance of passion and clarity for willing yourself to change your behavior. Do not misunderstand me: will power is important. Yet, your will power waxes and wanes. So, to help yourself out in your behavior modification when things get particularly tough, be sure to design structural supports tohelp you. What's a structural support? Anything outside of you that will reinforce the behavior modification and keep you accountable. For example, exercise with a partner; that will keep you going to thegym. Or, in the pursuit of becoming an early riser, have someone call you in the mornings. Or, meet with a friend every two weeks to discuss your progress on public speaking. Or, work with a life coach or an executive coach for your personal and professional growth to help you gain insights into your behavior, take consistent action, and hold yourself accountable for your behavior modification. In sum, behavior modification is not complicated, but it can be hard. By understanding the behavior modification process and the most potent strategies in your toolkit - in addition of course to motivation and drive - you can drastically increase your odds of success in your personal development endeavors. Good luck! |
Custom Search
Rescue Yourself!
Time Management Strategies to Take Your Life Back
