I’d love to tell you that I’m genetically productive. Or a natural early riser. Or some freak of nature who can automatically do hard things. I’m not. I never was and I never will be. BUT, I can trick myself into being these things using 3 strategies. You can too – here’s how:
- Reduce friction (Make it easy to start)
- Automate your behaviour (Plan your actions so you don’t have to think)
- Use the Compound Effect (Align the long-term with the short-term)
1. Reduce friction (Make it easy to start)
James Clear talks about reducing friction in his book “Atomic Habits”. He uses the example of flossing. When he was trying to start flossing his teeth daily, he wanted to make it as easy as possible. He left a little bowl of those pre-made dental flossers next to his toothbrush so they were visible and readily available. Every time he’d go to brush his teeth, he’d see the flossers and be reminded to floss. This seems simple and easy, but it’s effective. Even though there was only a small amount of friction associated with the old way, it was still enough to deter him, even slightly! By reducing the friction associated with flossing, he made it simple and easy to start doing something he didn’t particularly want to do.
Think about a goal you’ve set recently. Maybe it’s about running 5 km, or learning to play an instrument. Maybe it’s even flossing daily! How could you make it easier to start? Maybe it’s leaving your running gear out before you go to sleep, to remind yourself to go for your morning jog. Or maybe it’s leaving your guitar out of the case so you can immediately pick it up and start playing. The less friction there is around starting, the easier it will be.
2. Automate your behaviour (Plan your actions so you don’t have to think)
Make it so you don’t have to think. If you can make doing something second nature, you won’t even have to think about it. This works both positively and negatively. A prime negative example would be phone usage. Typically, any time spent waiting, people will automatically pull out their phone and start scrolling. This isn’t necessarily helpful or fulfilling, but because it’s automatic behaviour, it’s hard to stop doing it.
This can also be applied in a positive way too: A prime positive example would be putting our seatbelt on when we get in the car. Once we’re in the car, we’re primed from since we were kids to put our seatbelt on. We don’t even have to think about it.
We can leverage automated behaviour for our own benefit. Take grocery shopping as an example and let’s say you want to cut down on junk food. One way to automate this would be to make a list before you go. You’ve already automated what you’re going to buy. You stick to your list. Let’s say you want to automate this further, you could only bring the exact money you need – skip the cards and just bring cash. (You could set up a Revolut or N26 account, or another bank account, strictly for grocery shopping and transfer the exact amount you need into it if you don’t use cash).
By automating our behaviour, we can “train” ourselves to do the right things. In the words of James Clear “the best way to break a bad habit is to make it impossible to do”.
3. Use the Compound Effect (Align the long-term with short-term)
The compound effect is the act of doing a little a lot, where results compound to hit larger milestones and bigger targets.
Let’s start at New Years; the time where people will reinvent themselves, buy gym memberships and cut back on the booze. It doesn’t tend to last for too long. Come February or March, a lot of those great intentions have wandered off. Why is that? Why do we start strong yet drop out before the finish line? It’s a lot to do with diminishing motivation and lack of visibility of results.
Let’s say I set a goal for myself to run a marathon. It’ll take some time before I can see that achievement. That’s demoralizing. I’m doing all of this work, I’m running everyday, but I still don’t see any results. I still can’t run a marathon. I can’t see any of my hard work because the achievement or reward element is too far away. But what would happen if I changed the goal posts? What if I focused on each individual km that makes up the 42 km marathon instead of the final result? Suddenly, I have very real results. I start with 1 km, then 2 km, then 5 km. Suddenly I’m running 10 km on the weekend and pushing upwards. Now that’s rewarding! Each week I set a new target and commit to it. My motivation doesn’t diminish because I’m seeing real results each week. Running a marathon is a feat and can seem monstrous and impossible starting off. Running 1 km every morning for a week? That’s a lot more manageable.
The main method of using the compound effect is:
- Set your long term goal
- Set the time frame you want to achieve it in (be reasonable and realistic)
- Break your long-term goal into short-term milestones and align them on a weekly basis
You can apply this to everything. Here’s an example:
Want to lose 10 kg? First, set a time period (e.g. 10 weeks, or 20 weeks). Next, realign your long-term goal with weekly, short-term milestones (e.g. lose 1 kg every week for 10 weeks, or 0.5 kg per week for 20 weeks). That’s a lot more doable! It should look something like this:
- Long-term goal: Lose 10 kg
- Time frame: 20 weeks
- Weekly milestones: 0.5 kg per week
Have a think about goals you’ve set in the past, or goals you currently have but are finding difficult to follow through on. How can you break these down in smaller chunks? How can you make each chunk achievable on a weekly basis? By aligning your long-term goal with short-term milestones, which have clear results, you can reach targets that might have originally seemed impossible. In the words of Confucius, “the man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones”.
Conclusion
There you have it! The 3 ways I outsmart the lazy me and how you can too:
- Reduce friction (Make it easy to start)
- Automate your behaviour (Plan your actions so you don’t have to think)
- Use the Compound Effect (Align the long-term with the short-term)