Starting and running a successful business is one of the most stressful things a human being can endure. You must master difficult emotions such as fear, worry, uncertainty all while working long hours, and battling sleep deprivation.
Entrepreneurs that focus on their personal wellbeing are more effective at work. This is why business owners need to build daily habits that will help them live a balanced life.
Breaking unhealthy habits and taking up healthier ones is not easy, and many people fail. Luckily, there are now some proven strategies we can use to create new habits. Read on for more information on how you can successfully build healthy habits to improve your business and life.
Identify Your Desired Habits
Before you can come up with a plan to build healthy habits, you must first identify the habits that will make the biggest positive difference in your life. Unhealthy habits, like overeating and smoking, can be detrimental to our health. But healthy habits, like exercise and standard bedtimes, can build our resilience and health.
Some of the healthiest habits you could develop including sleeping for at least eight hours a night, exercising every day, drinking 8 glasses of water daily, etc.
Create Daily Micro-Habits That You Can Commit to
The key to success is to create easy daily goals that you can follow until the new habit becomes automatic. One reason why we fail at new year’s resolutions is that we are often too ambitious with our goals. It is easier to commit to one easy and achievable goal than many difficult ones.
Let’s say you want to start writing content for 30 minutes every morning. It may be difficult because your body and mind will resist the new habit. To succeed, you could start with the easier goal of writing for five minutes every day.
Waking up for a five-minute walk is very doable and you may even look forward to doing it daily. Once that becomes a habit you can slowly increase the amount of time you walk each day before progressing to running. In a few months, you will find that you have developed the habit of an early morning run.
Set Up Cues
Cues are behaviors that precede your habits. For example, reading a bedtime story may be a cue for your children to go to bed. Drinking a strong cup of tea may be a cue for you to start working. Being aware of and eliminating the cues that trigger bad habits could help you get rid of them.
For instance, if you overeat when bored, you could find a hobby that you enjoy taking the place of overeating. Cues are a great tool for setting up habits too. For example, if you want to exercise in the morning, waking up could be your cue to change into your work-out gear and go on to train.
Plan For Success and Overcome Obstacles With Systems
To support your new habit, put systems in place that will ensure your success. For example, you will be more likely to succeed at healthy eating if you throw out all the junk food from your home. If you want to run every morning, lay out your clothes by your bedside to make it easier for you to wake up early and change.
You can also pair your new habit with an activity that you love doing. For example, you may find it easier to get more work done if you limit yourself to listening to your favorite songs only while working.
You must also make plans for how you will overcome obstacles to achieving your new goal. For instance, if you love eating cookies sold at a bakery on your walk home, start using a different route to avoid the cookie shop.
Also, have a plan for what you will do when you get triggered or tempted by unhealthy habits that you want to leave behind. Perhaps you could have someone that you could call to discuss your trigger, or you could choose to go for a walk whenever a stressful situation comes up.
Reward Yourself
You should reward yourself whenever you reach important milestones in your journey to encourage you to stick to the new healthy habit. For example, after 30 days of exercising you could reward yourself with new workout gear that you have been coveting. This will encourage you to continue exercising.
Do not reward yourself with unhealthy items such as sugary treats or overspending to buy your treat.
Track Your Progress
Another important tip you should use to build healthy habits is to track your daily progress. You can do this by marking your days on a physical calendar, on a journal, or on your phone using apps. Journaling is a great way to track your progress as you can write down your feelings and work through any temptations you may be facing.
Knowing how many days you have been doing the new habit could motivate you to stick to the journey. For instance, if you have not smoked for 29 days and get tempted to do so, the desire not to break a 30-day non-smoking streak may prevent you from falling off the wagon.
Stay Consistent
Finally, when trying to build a healthy habit the one thing you must never do is give up. The first few attempts you make may end up in failure. Each time you fail, analyze your plan, and see what didn’t work. Instead of giving up on the new habit, choose a different strategy.
One of the main reasons we give up on our goals is because of our love for instant gratification. While it isn’t logical, many people get disheartened if they don’t see any results on their scale or body after two weeks of dieting and exercise. Having a realistic view of the time it will take to see results from a new habit may prevent you from getting disappointed and giving up the pursuit of a healthy habit.
Build Healthy Habits for a Fulfilling Life
Healthy habits can help increase your productivity at work while helping you to live a longer happier life. The problem is that we know the habits we should be following but it is very hard for us to build healthy habits.
If you need more help with integrating daily habits that’ll help your business, set up a quick consultation to see how I can help.