How to Break Bad Habits and Build Good Habits (Using Behavioral Psychology)

Corey Wilks, Psy.D. (: 00:00

So here's the thing, January 12th is National Quitters Day, AKA the day most people give up on their New Year's resolutions. Most people can't even make it two weeks into trying to achieve their goals or build better habits, which means whether you're trying to commit to the whole new year, new you thing, or if you're just trying to build better habits any time during the year, without the right strategies, you're bound to fail or at least really struggle, which is where I commit.

I'm going to teach you three strategies that I use as a psychologist that will make building better habits, whether you're trying to break bad habits or create good ones, infinitely easier. Plus these strategies don't require you to rely on willpower or put in a ton of effort. Let's get started. So strategy number one is to perform what psychologists call a functional analysis. It sounds fancy and complicated. It really isn't. All functional analysis means is we look at a given behavior, given habit, and we ask what

function does this serve? What purpose does it have? Meaning, what need is this habit fulfilling for you? See, a lot of people just try to change bad habits without really understanding what function those habits were serving in the first place. And when you do this, you create basically a vacuum where this old habit was serving a function that you still need to meet in some way, but because you just

took away that bad habit without putting in something else that fulfills that same need, you create this vacuum and then you still have problems. Which means you eventually revert back to that old bad habit. So before you can change a habit, you have to understand what function it serves, why you do that habit in the first place. Because once you understand the function that behavior has, you can start to find alternative, better habits to put in its place. So for example,

Let's say you're trying to eat healthier, but you keep eating junk food. You've tried hunger suppressants, fad diets, and making healthy junk food snacks, but you keep eating junk food, which is sabotaging your health goals. So do a functional analysis. Ask what function does eating junk food serve? Maybe you realize that you cope with stress by eating junk food, because eating junk food makes you feel better in the moment.

Corey Wilks, Psy.D. (: 02:16

and gives you a sense of control when otherwise you feel powerless or overwhelmed in other areas of your life. So this maladaptive, bad behavior is eating junk food. And the function of this behavior is to cope with stress. Cool, well now that we understand the function that eating junk food serves, now we can start to find better alternative behaviors to replace it with. That fulfill the same or similar function.

So maybe you find that other alternative behaviors that help you cope with stress might include things like reading a book, calling a friend, taking a walk, meditating, journaling, going to the gym, doing jujitsu, something like that. This is why your old strategies of hunger suppressants, fad diets, or trying to make healthy junk food snacks didn't work because none of them serve the function to help you cope with stress.

This is why none of those strategies worked and why you kept reverting back to eating regular junk food. Because your need to cope with stress wasn't being effectively met with these other old strategies. If you did a functional analysis and determined instead that the reason you keep eating junk food is because you get bored and you're looking for some way to stave off boredom or to get some excitement in your life, then that would determine the other alternative behaviors you do that would fulfill the same function.

to help you not feel bored in the moment. This is why before you try to change your behavior, you have to understand the function that behavior serves. Because every habit we do, every behavior we engage in, for better or worse, whether it is healthy, adaptive, or maladaptive, we do for a specific reason. But it's up to us to figure out what that reason is if we want to substitute in better, healthier habits. Strategy number two, you can leverage being a cognitive miser.

Basically, humans are lazy. We don't like putting in effort. From an evolutionary perspective, being lazy, aka conserving our mental and physical energy, is adaptive. It's helped us survive as a species. Most people struggle with being lazy, but we can actually leverage our laziness to achieve our goals. We just need to understand a simple concept, friction. Friction just comes down to making something more or less convenient. Because the more convenient something is, the more likely we are to do it.

Corey Wilks, Psy.D. (: 04:38

The less convenient something is, the less likely we are to do it. That's all friction is. So if there's something you want to do more of, make it more convenient by reducing the friction. If there's something you want to do less of, then make it inconvenient by increasing friction. So basically, whatever you want to do, ask yourself, how could I make this either as convenient or as inconvenient as I can think of? Then just do that.

Here's what I mean. Let's say you wanted to decrease the habit of eating cookies all the time. Well, then you would need to increase the friction of getting cookies. So instead of keeping cookies like on your desk or in your bedroom or somewhere super close, maybe you don't keep them in the house at all. So when you get a craving for cookies, you have to weigh your craving for them against the effort it'll take to put on pants, get in the car, drive to the store, find the cookies, buy the cookies, get back in the car.

drive back home, take your pants back off, and then finally have cookies. You're looking at spending 30 plus minutes just to go acquire said cookies. Most bad habits are impulsive. So the more friction we can add, the more of a delay we can create, which allows us to be less impulsive. Plus we're lazy. Spending 30 plus minutes to go get cookies when the actual craving would probably only last a couple minutes and then go away, will typically just be too much effort.

Not always, mind you, but often. Like if you're dead determined to go get cookies, then yes, you're gonna go drive and get cookies. But most of the time, this little bit of friction is enough to keep you from engaging in this quote unquote bad behavior you're actively trying to stop doing. On the other hand, let's say you wanted to increase a habit of reading every day. Well then you need to decrease the friction to reading every day. For example, I love starting my day by reading the Daily Stoic.

because it allows me to kind of center myself and set my intentions for the day. So I put it on my desk so it's right in front of me as soon as I sit down to start working. I don't have to hunt it down on my bookshelf, get up to grab it from the other room or worrying about trying to read it each day. It's right there in front of me with zero friction. It's okay to be lazy, to be a cognitive miser, leverage it to achieve your goals and build better habits by increasing or decreasing friction accordingly.

Corey Wilks, Psy.D. (: 07:02

Strategy number three, build in behavioral nudges. So behavioral nudges are a key concept in environmental design. Basically assume that you're gonna have zero motivation when it counts. Now with that assumption in place, how can you design your environment to still facilitate your desired goals or habits? For example, let's say you wanna drink more water throughout the day, but you absolutely suck.

Instead of keeping your water on the floor beside of you, which would be out of your peripheral vision, maybe you keep it on your desk so that it is within your peripheral vision. Well, now seeing the water bottle acts as a behavioral nudge. It nudges you and says, hey, maybe you'd need to take a drink. Like I will literally drink two to three times as much water in a day if my water bottle is in front of me versus on the floor. Even if it's the same distance from me, like within arm's reach, if it's not in my peripheral vision,

then it's out of sight, out of mind. But if it's within my peripheral vision, then it is in sight, in mind. So seeing my water bottle acts as a nudge to engage in the behavior of drinking it. Grocery stores use behavioral nudges to get you to impulse buy stuff all the time. Think about it. You've just finished shopping, you've diligently checked off everything on your shopping list, and then you get to the register. Suddenly you're bombarded with all these impulse buys at the checkout counter.

sugary sodas in the cooler you have to walk past. And then suddenly you think, oh, I'm thirsty all of a sudden. Or the packs of gum at the counter that are at eye level. You see them and you think, oh, I almost forgot. Let me get another pack. Or all the candy bars on either side of you. Suddenly you tell yourself, well, I mean, one candy bar won't hurt. Let me just get one as a treat for the road. That's environmental design. Behavioral nudges can be used against you to enslave you with bad habits.

Or you can choose to take back control and leverage them to facilitate your freedom by building better habits. Your choice. And ultimately, here's a simple concept when it comes to understanding how to build better habits. We don't do things for no reason. Every habit and everything we do, for better or worse, we do for a reason. The better we can understand the why behind our habits, the better we can become.

Corey Wilks, Psy.D. (: 09:23

at breaking bad ones and making good ones that set ourselves up for success. These three strategies, performing a functional analysis, leveraging being a cognitive miser, and building in behavioral nudges are the foundation to help us do just that. My goal is to share what I know as a psychologist to help creators like you reach their potential in life and business. If this resonated with you, let me know what you think and how you plan to apply some of these strategies in your own life.

And consider sharing this with someone who needs these strategies to achieve their goals and build better habits for themselves this year. Until next time, take it easy.