Finding the best way to change habits was frustrating for me before I truly understood how they are created. I’d commit to a shift, my heart filled with good intentions. Then, sometimes sooner rather than later, I’d fall back into the same habits. Which was beyond frustrating and defeating.

Then I learned the anatomy of a human habit – and how to change them! Here’s that scoop.

Attention Creates Habits

Our habits are formed over time, thanks to the power of repetitive attention in our brain. As the attention repeats, our brain begins to hardwire it into what’s known as a habit loop.

Over time, many repetitive habit loops become unconscious – for example, driving. How often do you get to your destination and not really remember all of the driving behaviors that got you there? That’s an unconscious habit loop.

When you consider that over 95% of our behaviors and decisions are driven by our unconscious, these habit loops become very important in our lives and in our ability to change.

When we consciously choose to break bad habits – we can use the components of that habit to create triggers that allow us to shift the behavior.

It takes more than a commitment to shift our behavior. It takes repeated attention to the right habit that we want.

The Power of Repeated Attention

Part of the challenge in shifting our habits is the internal conflict around those very habits.

We process new information in our unconscious mind. That new information or behavior sticks in our unconscious mind for 21-30 days.

After that time has passed, we move that information or new habit loop into our conscious mind for long term storage and access.

When we begin to replace a habit pattern with a new pattern, our unconscious mind leads the shift. After all, this is a new piece of behavior to become a habit.
The challenge begins when our conscious mind accesses our habitual memory and throws on the brakes. Even as our unconscious mind is suggesting a new behavior, our conscious mind is forcing our known habit, triggering our unconscious mind to focus on the safety that habit brings.

The result? We are conflicted.

In the presence of conflict or threat – innate status quo bias drives us to default to the known, or in this case, the bad or unwanted habit.

How to Change Habits

It’s actually fairly simple, it just takes patience and diligence.

To change a habit, we consciously and repeatedly pay attention to the new habit we want. We use our attention on the new habits we want to reprogram, or break, the old unwanted habits.

We’ve all heard that it takes about 21 -30 days to change a habit, give or take.

We have to consciously pay attention to the new choice long enough and for enough repetitions to replace the old habit stored in our conscious mind. That’s where attention density comes into action, or the amount of attention and the length of the attention.

Another key is to pay attention to what we want using our senses, not our logic. you see, our unconscious mind is sensory in its nature. It doesn’t use words, it uses sensory data; sight, feelings, sounds, tastes and smells.

When you shift your attention to what you want, create sensory information to show your unconscious mind what you want. Use your senses to imagine the life you deserve. Daydream and crank up the technicolor, feelings and sound!

The Bottom Line

The good news is that for everyday habits, once we consciously change our attention to focus on new habits for ~30 days, our habit loop and wiring changes. We break the unwanted habits by replacing them with our new choice, and we successfully adapt.

You can do anything for 30 days, right? So of course you can focus and stick to your commitment for 3 to 4 weeks. You will be successful.

Image courtesy of mrgabityt