Breaking Bad Habits

By Troy Flint

New year, new you. January is the month of reinvention. Or, at least, the month to aspire toward reinvention. The last few days on social media have been like an online self-help convention. Each scroll uncovers reflections on the past year and motivational speeches for the next one. Everywhere you look, people are pledging to cast off their old bad habits and adopt new ones. Time to transform. Time to become the best version of yourself! It’s hell.

At least it used to be. I’ve always struggled with transformation and I used to make a point of avoiding new year’s resolutions and anywhere I might be exposed to them. Time and age and circumstance have mellowed me on that score. I’ve (belatedly) come to appreciate the importance of an intentional approach to personal growth and becoming a father has had more to do with that than anything else.

Somehow, it’s harder to rationalize your shortcomings as harmless or endearing when you have mouths to feed and eyes looking up to you. The example you set actually matters and the ripple effect of your failures extends a lot further. Also, you realize that you have a lot less runway and a lot fewer tomorrows to make the changes you should have made today. Once that realization sinks in, you’re left with the daunting example of how to begin that transformation.

One of the best resources I’ve found on this topic is a book called The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life And Business by the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter Charles Duhigg. There are too many helpful nuggets in the book to recount here, but maybe its single most important lesson is The Golden Rule of Habit Change. The rule is that you can’t extinguish a bad habit, you can only change it.  In other words, you need to discover the emotional or physical need that’s driving the habit and find a replacement for the action that’s satisfying it.

This idea is reinforced by study after study. It’s influenced treatments for alcoholism, obsessive compulsive disorder and other conditions, but also provides a template for ending more mundane habits. As the book explains, “Once you’ve figured out your habit loop – you’ve identified the reward driving your behavior, the cue triggering it, and the routine itself – you can begin to shift the behavior. You can change to a better routine by planning for the cue and choosing a behavior that delivers a reward you are craving.”

Understanding this process can help you conquer your own bad habits and help steer your child toward good ones as well. If you want to curb a bad habit your child has developed, you first need to understand what’s prompting the behavior, then understand what purpose the behavior is serving (in your child’s mind) and then involve your child in the selection of an alternative. This all requires relinquishing an authoritarian approach for one grounded in empathy and relating to your child. Disclaimer: This is hardly foolproof, but it’s the best method I’ve found. And it beats another year of failed resolutions.

Photo by Bruno Nascimento