On Habits

It’s time for my writing. I need to write a little bit every day so that I could get accustomed to it. As they say, making something a habit is easier than discipline. Well, maybe nobody says that, but I think I heard something similar. So, creating a habit instead of discipline. Nothing wrong with discipline, but it’s just takes more energy than habit.

But is it really possible to create a habit? I remember that a decade back it was a common knowledge that to create a habit you need to do the same thing for 21 days. I was in an army, got up at 6 or seven, did my bed, went out running, and that for 11 months straight—and it didn’t became a habit. Once I was out in the civil world, I went back to my usual schedule: sleeping til noon, etc. But, of course, I didn’t do the same thing for 21 days straight. Even during the first 3 months in the army when they didn’t let us out, there was one day, sunday, when the schedule was different. On sundays we woke up at 7, instead of 6, and we didn’t have to go out for a run—it was a day off, so to say. Maybe this is the reason it didn’t became a habit.

Maybe, or maybe the 21 day rule is just false, totally made up? Recently I have heard people saying that 21 days is not enough—you need at least a month to form a habit. And what if 30 days is also not enough? Is it possible to form a habit? I’m starting to doubt it.

Some might come out with an example of smoking: you smoke every day, don’t you? Isn’t that a habit? Well, no. Smoking is an addiction?

What are the things in my everyday life that I do out of habit? Let me think… … Yes, I’m still thinking… Do I do anything out of habit? Well, I know how to type — as if that was a habit. This is a motoric skill, or whatever it’s called. Sometimes, I open my fridge, out of a habit—but it’s not comparable to sitting down to do some writing.

Sitting down to do some writing is more of a scheduling issue. If I would have a perfect schedule, I would sit down to write every day at 8:00. I drop off my kid at kindergarten at 7:30, walk back home with my dog, drink some coffee and start typing away, until the clock reaches 10:00 when it’s time for a meeting at work.

Are habits just a big hoax? Now I’m really starting do doubt them. It’s customary to talk about how you can build new habits, how you can become a better person just by changing your habits. Habits will make you a little bit more robotic, habits will take care of the things that you are avoiding, or not doing. Habits don’t require you to be disciplined? Is that so?

Lot of books, and thousands of courses have been sold on the premise of habits. It’s like a golden goose(or whatever its called) that will fix all of your problems—but what if these “habits” work only on small things: opening a fridge when you walk past it, biting your nails, looking down instead of into the eyes when talking to someone. These are motoric things. Not: sitting down behind the desk to write for two hours.

Not that I’m afraid of writing, not too much. I have already written a total of 600 words. And I guess that is enough for today, although I wanted to practice writing some coherent paragraphs.