Here’s how to live your life to its fullest potential
All the tips and tricks to bring out the maximum potential in you by treating the root problem: breaking your bad habits and forming good ones.
An extensive summary of the book, Atomic Habits authored by James Clear.
Disclaimer: I have written multiple book summaries in the past as well have made multiple presentations of books, but, this book is unlike your average life-changing book. It’s a totally different treasure. This book’s content is very rich. Every line and every paragraph carries its own wisdom. And it's not like ideas are getting repeated after few pages. The numerous examples are open to the reader’s interpretation as he/she deems fit. This story is 2500+ words and is a 10-minute read.
Writing a summary of such a high-calibre content-rich book does not make any sense as everything in the book is in the least condensed form possible. And omitting anything from it will decrease the value too. However, I have given my best in writing this piece by including examples, including actionables, mentioning ideas in brief so that anyone who has read the whole book can immediately relate to it.
The habits we have, define us, our personality, and essentially the tiny efforts we put in consciously or subconsciously ultimately affect us in remarkable ways.
Introduction
The author starts with his own story of being a hopeless kid with multiple medical complications when he was in high school. Next follows his journey to being named the ESPN Academic All-America Team, shattering college record books, and much more by the end of this final year. He puts forward the context of how small habits changed his life during his college years.
The introduction is very powerful. I have read the introduction alone many times and every time that one reads it, he/she can appreciate the impact that habits have had on the author and how much potential does it carry for each one of us to improve our own lives.
“Atomic” Habits
The first chapter of the book is titled, “The Surprising Power of Atomic Habits” and starts with the example of the recent dominance of the British Cycling Team.
The efforts made by any person on their habits can bring exponential changes over a considerable period of time. You can think of this as a sort of compounding phenomenon. Get a calculator and calculate 0.99 to the power of 365 and 1.01 to the power of 365 and compare the two values. You will get the idea. FYI, the calculator will yield, 00.03 and 37.78 respectively.
There’ll be a time when efforts will not yield any visible results, just like the characteristics of latent heat during the phase change phenomenon.
Forget about goals, focus on systems instead
Goals are about the results you want to achieve. Systems are about the processes that lead to those results.
The author emphasizes focusing on the systems instead of trying to achieve the goals. A similar approach to life is communicated in The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck by Mark Manson. Mark also tells you to focus on enjoying the journey you are on; enjoying the problems you face.
There are four reasons given in the book, Atomic Habits, as to why systems give results than goals:
Problem #1 Winners and losers have the same goals
Problem #2 Achieving a goal is only a momentary change
Problem #3 Goals restrict your happiness
Problem #4 Goals are at odds with long-term progress
Habits define our identity
The idea of our habits defining our identity may or may not seem odd to you. To understand this part, pay attention to the image below.
Outcome-based habits are those which are built from outwards to inwards and identity-based habits are built inwards to outwards in the above diagram. To give an example consider this sentence from the book: The goal is not to read a book, the goal is to become a reader. This and this article by James Clear himself explain the idea in more detail.
Changing your habits to change your identity is a continuous process. The main problem here is the direction in which the change happens; rather than coming inside from out of the circle which promotes outcome-based habits, the focus should be moving outwards from the centre of the circle thereby forming an identity-based habit.
The four steps for building better habits (or bad ones!)
- Cue
- Craving
- Response
- Reward
The above four steps form a neurological feedback loop starting with a cue triggering a craving, which highlights the response, and you get the reward. The reward satisfies the craving and is thus associated with the cue.
For example; It’s 12 AM in the night and it’s your cue to put down your phone and head for the bed. You crave the feeling of sleep. You put down your phone and get in the bed, which is the response and when you wake up in the morning, you are rewarded with a sound sleep. This reward has satisfied your craving from the last night and thus whenever it’s 12 AM, it’s your cue for the craving.
Four laws of behaviour change
The following four laws are the steps in creating a good habit mentioned against the steps mentioned in the last paragraph:
- Cue — Make it obvious
- Craving — Make it attractive
- Response — Make it easy
- Reward — Make it satisfying
How to create good habits?
First law: Make it obvious
There are a few steps that are explained in detail below which are based on the first law: Make it obvious. These steps essentially form the core of the book.
- Pointing and calling — get rid of the bad habits
- Implementation Intention
- Habit Stacking
Pointing and calling
Before creating new habits, it’s wise to get in control of your existing habits and get rid of the bad habits. Before getting rid of them, you need to be on the lookout for them. You might not necessarily be aware of all of them. Pointing and calling is an approach in which you pay attention to the small details happening around you. And you call it aloud to yourselves. For example, if you are wasting time on Youtube, every time you open Youtube, you need to point to this behaviour and be aware of the fact by saying out loud, I am opening Youtube again.
You can use this tool to analyze your current habits. The article in the hyperlink also explains the above concepts in detail with examples.
Implementation Intention
When you decide you want to do something, how do you finalize it? In your mind? And how many times has that idea worked out? How many times have you thought to sleep early, eat healthy food, exercise, and how many times you have failed on that?
One of the major reasons is that we finalize our decisions in our mind and it’s just the decision of what we will be doing. There are no concrete details in our pledge.
Implementation Intention helps us to bring WHAT, WHEN and WHERE into our steps of creating a new habit. It is a plan you make about when and where to act.
Whenever you think of doing something, fill out this sentence:
I will [BEHAVIOUR] at [TIME] in [LOCATION]
For example, I will eat my breakfast at 9 AM in my kitchen.
Implementation Intention takes use of the two most common cues responsible for Habits; time and location. Forming the above sentence gives a person a cue about when to do something or when “this” happens, I will do “this”.
To start your first habit, you can pick starting on the first day of the week, month, or year.
Habit Stacking
Habit Stacking is a method to use Implementation Intention in our personal and professional lives. Habit Stacking is exactly what you think it is. Identify a habit that you do every day and stack the new habit on top of your existing habit.
To summarize: you will think that after doing this (current habit), I will do that (new habit). It is one of the best ways to build new habits.
You can link multiple habits together back to back to match the cues: time and location.
The current habit can be a habit or an action that you do. For example; coming back from the office and sitting on the sofa is a current habit. You can decide to eat a fruit every day when you come back from the office and sit on the sofa.
You can also create general habit stacks which do not use time and location as a cue but rather the particular situation. An example could be to practice singing whenever you are alone. Or to always prefer the stairs rather than using a lift. Or to think about your career goals every day while you are bathing.
Link to a more detailed article on the same topic by James Clear.
Motivation is overrated; environment often matters more
Bottled water sales increased and soda sales dropped at a hospital cafeteria by deliberately altering the “choice architecture”. Items kept at eye level at a supermarket tend to be purchased more than items kept at ground level and are generally found filled with expensive stuff. The area at the end of aisles carries even more buying traction by the customers. In short; the availability of any particular product affects its consumption just like Bud Light & Starbucks.
The human body has about 11 million sensory abilities, out of which 10 million are dedicated to sight. Visual cues are the greatest catalyst of our behaviour.
The context is the cue
One place, one function, or One space, one use (in your usual place of residence). Habits can be easier to change and habit in a new environment because you are no more fighting against the old cues.
The secret to self-control
Heroin relapse study from 1971 US Vietnam war. Bad habits are autocatalytic. Obese people getting depressed or troubled can trigger more overeating. More explained in this article by James Clear.
Once a habit has been encoded, the urge to act follows whenever the environmental cues reappear. It is highly unlikely that you can forget an old habit completely (ex: smoking urge while horse riding).
The secret to self-control is to make the habit & cues invisible, rather than making it obvious. This essentially is the inversion of the first law.
Another way to break bad habits is by using the concept of bright lines. James Clear has brilliantly explained the concept in this article using the example of Miranda rights.
Making habits irresistible
Habits are a dopamine-driven feedback loop. Most bad habits like taking drugs, social media usage, porn consumption are related to higher levels of dopamine. Dopamine spike happens in the anticipation of a reward as well as when the pleasure is experienced; wanting and liking.
100% of a part of our brain lights up during wanting; whereas only 10% in case of liking.
Temptation bundling
One way to apply a psychology theory, Premack’s Principle, is this: “more probable behaviours will reinforce less probable behaviours”. The same is temptation bundling.
The same is explained below:
After I do [current habit], I will do [habit I need]
After I do [habit I need], I will do [habit I want]
The strategy is to pair an action you want to do with an action you need to do.
Role of family and friends
Case study of Polgar sisters & Laszlo Polgar. We pick up habits from the culture we are in. We imitate:
- The close
- The many
- The powerful
Actionable from 1) The close: To build a good habit, join a culture where 1. your desired behaviour is the normal behaviour and 2. you already have something common with the group (to embrace identity change along with your group)
2) Imitating the many: Conforming to social norms
3) Imitating the Powerful
Reprogram your brain to enjoy hard habits
You can achieve this by a slight mindset shift ex: you get to wake up early instead of you have to wake up early.
The same technique can be used to create a motivation ritual to overcome pregame jitters just like multiple NBA & MLB players have fixed pre-game rituals that they all follow and helps them get into the game mode.
Don’t slip into motion, take action
Thinking about 20 ideas in your mind for writing an article is motion. Sitting down and actually writing that article is action. In an experiment with a photography class, they were divided into two groups wrt how they will be graded in the course.
One half was to be graded on only quantity and the other half on quality only with only 1 photograph to be submitted at the end of the term. At the end of the course, the quantity group was the one that produced the best photographs because, in the process of clicking numerous photographs and experimenting, they honed their skills.
The biggest reason we slip into motion rather than taking action is that we want to delay failure.
Habits are formed based on frequency and not time. Repetitions are required.
Motion makes you feel that things are moving but can take place as a means of procrastination. You don’t want to be just planning every time, but actually practising. This is the 3rd law: you just need to get your reps in.
The law of least effort
The less energy a habit requires, the more likely it is to occur ex: browsing social media on your smartphone & application of lean production by the Japanese manufacturing industry in the 1970s. Practice environment design to make your hard habits seem easy into your routine. You can introduce enough friction so that the repetition of your habit is impeded.
The two-minute rule
Whenever you start a new habit, it should take less than two minutes to do it. Your goal might be to crack an exam but your gateway habit is to open your notes and study for ten minutes. Your goal might be to run a marathon but your gateway habit is to put on your running shoes. The point is to master the habit of showing up. You can only improve a habit if you have established it.
Making it difficult
This is an inversion of the third law of behaviour change.
Sometimes success is less about making good habits easy and more about making bad habits hard. Which can be done by creating a commitment device. An example is paying for your yoga classes in advance. When the time comes to act, the only way to run away would cost money. Using technology is a great way to create a commitment device.
The cardinal rule of behaviour change
We are more likely to repeat a behaviour when the experience is satisfying. Karachi example; making the experience of hand washing a positive handwashing experience which ultimately led to better health among neighbourhood children.
What is immediately rewarded is repeated. What is immediately punished is avoided.
This is the cardinal rule of behaviour change.
Habit tracking: Sticking with good habits every day
Paper Clip Strategy: 1993, 23-year old stockbroker called Trent Dyrsmid joined a bank in Abbotsford, Canada, and moved one paper clip from filled to empty jar with each sale call made and he kept calling till he moved all the 120 paper clips.
Don't put up a zero any day. Even a “one” will do even if the regular habit requires a 100.
Accountability Partner
Having an accountability partner can create an immediate cost to breaking your habit for even ones. Formal or informal contracts can be made to bring accountability with the inclusion of fines increasing with the degree of infraction.
When genes matter and when they don’t
Michael Phelps and long-distance Olympic runner Hicham El Guerrouj are 6' 4" and 5' 9" tall but they have the same length inseam. Find your competence in which you have an edge over the others; find a game where the odds are in your favour.
Big Five personality traits are OCEAN in short. Using this link, you can get to know more about yourself by taking a personality test.
Goldilocks Rule
Story of Steve Martin, the comedian. The Goldilocks Rule states that humans experience peak motivation when working on tasks that are right on the edge of their current abilities. Not too hard or easy. Just right.
Here, you can read in detail about the Goldilocks Rule.
Review and self-introspection
Few examples used in the book for review:
- CBE (Career Best Effort) used by head coach Pat Riley of the 1986 Lakers team
- Eliud Kipchoge takes notes after every practice & reviews at EOD
- Katie Ledecky records her wellness, notes on nutrition, sleep & gets it reviewed by her coach
- Comedian Chris Rock tries jokes at multiple small clubs
- Investors and executives keep “decision journal”
Another way you can include self-review is an annual review or half-yearly review and by using Integrity Report monthly or every six months. Using this link, you can access an actual Integrity Report published by the author of the book itself.
The book Atomic Habits is an absolute gem. But if you have already read it, then I would encourage you to read through the author’s articles on his website. The articles are as informative as the book and are much different from the contents given in the book.
You can also follow the author, James Clear here on Medium.
