Much of our life is managed by automation. Not of the computer variety, but of the behavioral variety. Automation of our behavior through habits. We need habits to simplify our life, to take everyday things that we do, and eliminate the cognitive effort it takes to do them.  This frees our mind to focus on more important matters. Tying our shoes, brushing our teeth, or taking a shower, often requires minimal thought.  They run through the motions that have been automatize.  

Atomic Habits

I recently finished reading Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear. In this book, James outlines the research on behavioral change and habit formation. This research lays the foundation for how to build new habits or break undesirable ones. He then writes with clarity and precision on how to implement these laws in your life. 

James identifies four laws of habit formation – make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, and make it satisfying – based on the four fundamental parts – cue, craving, response, and reward. James explains that to make new habits, we don’t need to supreme will power, but should create the conditions in our environment to make the habit formation inevitable.

Take for example, a habit I want to work on this year, the habit of writing. While I have done a ton of writing in my textbook, through this site, through my professional blog, and in my research, I wouldn’t call it a habit. I do it on an ad hoc basis, whenever it is required. But I want writing to become a regular part of my daily activities. This will give me more opportunity to refine and improve my craft of writing.

Using the Laws to Build Habits

How can I use James’ laws to make this habit a reality? First, I focused on making it obvious. For me to make this habit obvious, I needed a cue that would hold for every day of the week, whether that day is filled with teaching, research, service, professional development, or some other activity.

I already have a habit of sitting down to my computer with a cup of coffee to start work, first thing in the morning. Usually I spend that time checking email or reviewing my tasks for the day. But instead of doing these tasks, which can often take me down a rabbit hole of random activities, I will write for at least 30 minutes. I’m not defining what I write about, just that I will write. It could be a blog post (such as I’m doing write now), a research article, a chapter in a book, or a new tutorial for my students. That doesn’t matter, as long as I’m writing. The key is that I have a cue, getting coffee and sitting down to my computer first thing in the morning.

Second, I need to make the habit attractive. Fortunately for me, writing is never a truly horrific process. Many times I enjoy the cognitive challenge of explaining things. But I plan to also structure my environment to make the habit more attractive. First, I usually get up an hour before my children, so writing for 30 minutes in the morning could be accomplished without interruption.

I will also replace a habit my current habit of checking email and news first thing in the morning. This isn’t necessarily a bad habit, but isn’t directly helping me in my career. It’s a neutral habit, necessary to get the job done. I’ll still check email later, but it doesn’t need to be first. Instead, I want to start my day with something that will actively help me.

To make the habit easy, I’m not defining what I’m writing about or how many pages I’m writing. I’m just setting a time limit of at least 30 minutes to make it easy to develop the habit. I may end up writing one sentence during that time, but I will still do it. The key is to make starting the habit easy. As I develop the habit, I can consider additional requirements, but that comes later.

Lastly, I need to make the habit satisfying. To do this, I will reward my effort of writing with the dopamine kick I get from checking social media, email, and other news.

Inevitable Habit Success

Atomic Habits covers all the major elements of habit formation and removal. It even offers some advanced tactics, such as through using accountability partners and matching your personality to habits. But the key truth he makes is that if you continuous improve your life by 1% each month, the compound improvement over your lifetime is phenomenal. Building and improving your habits can lead to success in your life. I strongly recommend Atomic Habits to get