Habit Forming For Serial Procrastinators
All of us have habits we know we should be doing. New year’s resolutions wouldn’t exist if all of us already followed all the habits we desired. Habits like reading every day, taking out the bins each week or starting a running program.
Some people just seem to “get it”, and have developed habits which make it easy for them to constantly self improve and achieve their goals. These people are few. The rest of us stick with new habits for about as many days as those sticky hand toys can stick to anything.
Unlike them, our godlike willpower for resolutions like “I’ll lose 10 kg this year” or “I’m going to start waking up at 5 am”, lasts around 5 days, until something comes up and we forget all about the new leaf we just turned over.
What we need is accountability. I tried using a diary, I tried giving myself gold stars on a calendar, I even tried slap bets with friends. All of which only resulted in minor brain damage. I don’t blame my friends for being frustrated, I was that person who always claims to be making big changes but struggles to deliver.
So, how did I change my behaviour?
Here’s a quick guide to get you on track by creating accountability to track your good habits every day.
Enter the Loop Habit Tracker:
This is the most minimal, no bullshit habit tracking app I have ever had the pleasure of using. Sorry iPhone users, this open-source app is Android only (I’ve heard good things about streaks for IOS).
Have a look at this gorgeous UI:
What you’re seeing is my list of habits. The circles to the left represent how adapted to a habit you are. The ticks or crosses indicate if you did the habit or not. Ridiculously simple, right? This is all you need to stick to your habits.
By tapping on each habit, you can set how frequently you want to do them per week. Notice my kick-boxing row is all ticks, but only one is solid. That’s because I only aim to do kick-boxing twice a week, so the app doesn’t punish you as long as you get it twice a week.
The app lets you colour code each habit, my system is easy to follow; green habits are must do, yellow are should do, and red habits are done when you have time.
Here’s an overview of the process:
- Decide on a list of habits you’d like to form
- Add them one by one onto the list, for each habit you’ll need to enter the following:
- How often a week you need to complete them
- If you’d like a reminder to prompt you to check the habit off
- Sort your habits by critical to non-critical and apply the colours
- When you complete a habit, tick it off for the day
I find this system very enjoyable due to some genius features implemented by the developers. Firstly, you want the circle to the left of the habit to be full. Every day that you complete a habit, the circle inches closer to completion. Miss a day, and you’ll lose progress. The app uses an algorithm that takes into account every hit and missed day but allows you to recover a strongly ingrained habit quickly if you only miss a few days. Checking off a habit every day for 3 months will reward you with a 99% circle, which is the best score possible.
Each habit can be looked at individually. Here, you can see your habit strength over time and other cool facts, like your longest streak and what days of the week you usually complete the habit successfully.
So is that all there is to it? Yes, kind of.
You need to use this app every day for maximum effect. This is easy once you’ve set up prompts for all your habits which pop up as notifications throughout the day. For weekly habits, the app will prompt you exactly 7 days after the habit was last checked off. Perfect.
Achieving your goal of losing 10kg isn’t going to happen by thinking really hard about it. It happens over time by forming a habit and sticking to it, every day, for multiple months. There is no shortcut to success, but this app is one way to make sure you keep taking steps in the right direction.
Share the habits you are going to start in the comments below!
