Magical habits
In 1971, the U.S.-Vietnam War entered its 16th year.
Two members of Congress in Connecticut have released a shocking secret to the American public: Nearly 15 percent of U.S. troops in Vietnam are infected with heroin abuse.
This secret made the then US President Richard Nixon feel very headache. To save the troops, he decided to set up the Office of Prevention and Rehabilitation, with Lee Robbins in charge.
As we all know, once a person is infected with drug addiction, it is generally difficult to quit, and the relapse rate is almost 100%.
But Lee Robbins found that after sending these drug-addicted officers and soldiers back home, most of them successfully quit drug addiction: the relapse rate was only 5% within one year, and the relapse rate was only 12% within three years.
This extraordinary data has surprised and delighted many people. To find out what was really going on, Lee Robbins' team further followed up on the drug-addicted officers.
They found that those who did not succeed in quitting drug addiction were mostly because they continued to have contact with drug addicts after returning to China.
On the contrary, those officers and soldiers who successfully rehabilitated from drugs are because after returning to their families, the surrounding environment has undergone a complete change, there is no pressure of war, and there is no opportunity to contact drug addicts again.
In the book "Mastering Habits", James Clear, an expert on habit research, explains this:
So-called habits (such as drug addiction) are repetitive behaviors. After repeated many times, this behavior gradually does not require any brain cognitive processes to occur automatically.
This kind of automated mechanism, once deeply imprinted in people's minds, is almost impossible to remove. But we can reduce the chances of triggering habits by changing the environment.
An important feature of habits is that they exist in our minds in a "coded" way, such as:
As soon as you encounter something depressing, you can't help but light a cigarette; when you get home after work, you will automatically open the mobile phone game when you are tired; every time you get stuck at work, you take out your mobile phone, and then log on to social networking sites, aimlessly scratching.
The hidden "coding" here is:
Depression = cigarettes; exhaustion from work = mobile games; work jam = social networking sites.
Therefore, if you want to quit these habits, you must first try to avoid depression, exhaustion after work, and work jams.
Conversely, if you want to develop a good habit, you must establish and reinforce positive "coding."
Scientific studies have shown that showing cocaine pictures to drug users, even if it is only 33 milliseconds, can rekindle the desire for relapse.
In the face of mysterious habits, most people will always attribute the cause to the individual, so if you want to quit a certain habit, they will always tell us how to control yourself, such as abstinence, abstinence, and so on.
But James Cleare has a unique approach, and through the book Controlling Habits, he wants to tell us:
On the basis of self-discipline, by transforming the external environment and mastering the laws of habits, we can better develop or abstain from certain habits.
Put a barrier to bad habits and sugar good habits
Victor Hugo, the great French writer, was a man of severe procrastination. Sometimes, a manuscript can drag on for a year or more.
The publisher also had no choice but to postpone the delivery date repeatedly. In fact, he couldn't do anything about himself, because he had too much to socialize with.
Once, after 12 months of dragging a manuscript that had long been promised to others, he finally decided to make a decision.
To force himself to write, he asked his assistant to lock all his clothes in a cupboard he couldn't find, leaving only a warm shawl. His purpose was to keep himself without clothes to wear, so that he could not go out.
It turned out to work, and for the next 6 months, he stayed at home writing almost every day. The manuscript that was forced out is exactly the "Notre Dame de Paris" that we are familiar with.
In fact, in order to complete a task, sometimes it is necessary to force yourself.
Hugo's approach is psychologically called the "mechanism of creating commitment." In life, this trick is widely used in the formation and withdrawal of habits.
For example, in order to quit gambling, some people voluntarily require casinos and online poker sites to blacklist themselves, or deliberately stink their "cards" and "gambling products" among gamblers.
A friend of mine, in order to go to bed on time, set up a power timer that automatically cut off the router and power every 10 p.m.
These little things, which look a little hilarious, are actually very practical, according to James Clear:
The best way to break bad habits is to make them impractical. Keep it difficult until you get discouraged.
On the contrary, the secret to developing good habits is to constantly create a better environment, so that good habits are more attractive, more simple and easy to implement.
At the beginning of the 19th century, chewing gum was not called chewing gum, because it was neither sweet nor fragrant, and the taste was the same as chewing wax, so that sales could not go up.
It wasn't until 1891, when Wrigley added spearmint and juicy fruit flavors, that sales of chewing gum grew dramatically, and eventually many people became accustomed to chewing gum.
The same is true of most of the formation of good habits, and conditions must be created to make them sweeter.
A colleague of mine, in order to develop the habit of cooking at home, opened a special money fund account called "travel", and every time he cooked a meal at home, he deposited 50 yuan in the account. By the end of the year, if they had saved enough, they would withdraw the money and go on a trip.
In addition, in order to develop good habits, in addition to rewards, it is necessary to reduce the obstacles to forming good habits and make it simple and easy.
Many people want to develop the habit of reading and exercising for a long time, but they are always afraid of difficulties and dare not take action.
James Clear tells us that if we want to develop good habits, we should not scare ourselves at the beginning, and it is best to start in the most simplified way.
For example, you can use a method called the "two-minute rule," in which any habit that seems difficult is reduced to something that can be done in two minutes, and then start with the two-minute thing.
"Reading every night before bedtime" is simplified to "reading a page";
"Do 30 minutes of yoga" becomes "take out the yoga mat";
"Review homework" becomes "Open my notes";
"Run 3 miles" becomes "Tie my shoelaces."
It turns out that many times, when a good habit is not formed, what is missing is a good start and the so-called "portal habit". In fact, once you enter the "portal", you will most likely find that you tend to do more.
For example, when you've finished reading a page, you're probably thinking you might as well look at another page; when you've already taken out a yoga mat, you tend to think, "If you take it out anyway, you might as well do yoga."
There are many ways to develop good habits, but the purpose is the same: coercion and inducement, simple and easy, try to remove all kinds of obstacles.
Good habits are difficult and moderate, and good life is constantly improving
There are many ways to develop good habits, as long as you follow the principles of adding sugar and making it easy to do.
However, in life, the reason that hinders the formation of good habits is sometimes not that there are not enough skills, but another more fundamental problem that has not been solved, that is, many people do not know what kind of habits or what kind of career, suitable for themselves, are worth adhering to.
Some people can stick to a habit or career for years, or even decades, but some people stick to it for two or three days and then give up, either bored, not challenging, or too difficult to climb forever.
In 1955, 10-year-old boy Steve Martin sold amusement guides at Disney Amusement Park.
Later, he was transferred to the magic shop in the park and tried to tell jokes to customers. He soon discovered that customers didn't like the magic he performed, but rather liked him telling jokes.
Knowing this, he began to deliberately exercise his ability to tell jokes and perform in small clubs near Los Angeles. Sometimes there was no one in the club, but he still insisted on exercising, and he performed alone on stage.
Over the next 10 years, he experimented, adjusted and practiced, and fought to get into television. Finally, he got a chance to make an appearance on a talk show and, in the 1970s, became a regular on Tonight Talk Show and Saturday Night Live.
Finally, after 15 years of hard work, he became popular, setting a record of 63 days to perform in 60 cities, becoming one of the most well-known comedians in the United States.
Martin, apparently, had found a career that suited him, and his childhood experience told him that he was good at this career, and the process of continuous tempering later also showed that it was a challenging job.
In his own words: "Ten years of hard work, four years of improvement, and then four years of crazy success." ”
In The Habit of Mastering, James Clear argues that the best habits, or careers you want to stick to, must follow the so-called "Blonde Girl Guidelines," which is just the right amount of difficulty.
Martin's comedic career is the best example of the "Code for Blonde Girls". Every year, he expands his performance plot, but only by a minute or two. While keeping a few certainly amusing passages, add some new material that has not yet verified the effect.
Psychologists who study flow also believe that the difficulty of a career or a task is about 4% higher than their ability, it is not too simple or too difficult, and it is easiest for people to immerse themselves in it and achieve a state of flow.
Too easy, it will make people tired and bored, too difficult, and easy to hit self-confidence.
However, it is important to remind that although it is important to find a habit that is difficult and moderate, if a habit has been successfully formed, it will also become the beginning of self-limiting.
For example, reading for an hour before going to bed at night has become your habit. This is a good thing, but it also has the side effect that because you are used to reading for an hour, even if you have two hours of sufficient time on a given day, you will only stick to reading for one hour.
The real benefit of habits, According to James Clear, is that once you've become familiar with or automated an action or thought, you'll be more free to focus on higher-level demands. But the problem is that habits can also dull and solidify people's feedback mechanisms, hindering the pace of upward progress.
A master who is truly proficient in a certain field is not to master a good habit and everything will be fine, but to learn to constantly reflect on himself, and on the basis of old habits, constantly add new challenges and cultivate new good habits.
Basketball players, after mastering the dribble, will continue to exercise non-dominant hands to carry the ball to the basket, and after the surgeon's incision action has been comfortable, it must continue to exercise to deal with unexpected situations.
In this sense, finding habits that are difficult and moderate is only a phased skill, but what we really want to establish is a human life concept that is constantly improving.
Developing a good habit is not the end, step by step, down-to-earth, constantly testing and expanding the boundaries of our own ability, is the real meaning behind our research habits, what we should really pursue.
Lead Writer | Zeng Wei Edited by | Black Sheep
Image source | "Taos Behind Me" is partly from the Internet