The Reason for Habits

I have over the course of this blog routinely encouraged the creation of good habits as a way to change our behaviors. There is a simple reason this works. It moves the process of making good decisions from a taxing effort that we must continuously make to a reaction that we can perform without thinking.

The process of creating a habit is really about training the subconscious to do what we want it to do. At first we understand the habit or the behavior we are trying to change. We then develop an alternate way of reacting and force ourselves to repeat it.

This creates a precedent that our subconscious mind can use to help direct actions. Each voluntary repetition brings us closer to the point where we can behave the way we want without expending willpower to do it.