More years in good health, part 2: building better habits

In my opening opinion piece, ‘More years in good health: simple principles (part 1)’, I referenced the importance of habit formation within the context of boosting the number of years you spend in good health (something dear to my heart in light of our society’s under preparedness to deal with our ageing population).

In this opinion piece, I share my personal perspective (informed by self-directed research) on what habits are, why they are so important and how to forge them. Being able to form and sustain good habits is a superpower and the critical tool to staying independent as we age.

What is a habit?

A pattern of behaviours you are more, rather than less, likely to keep.

Habits could be perceived as passive. Things you do without thinking… In my opinion, habits require intentional design and active brain energy to form and maintain (the same is not true of compulsions and addictions). The longer you keep a habit, the less energy it takes to maintain. The opposite is also true, the less we practice habits, the easier it is to continue to shirk them.

Our internal voices keep us honest. At any point in time, we all know which habits we are keeping and which we are shirking. We also tend to know which are good and which are not. Like calories, not all habits are created equal. It’s also true that certain habits feel easier to pick up and maintain than others.

Habits pertaining to living more years in good health are without a doubt the type that most of us struggle to sustain. We tend to have full autonomy over our health and decisions relating to when we eat, sleep and exercise. By contrast, we feel at the whim of others in decisions relating to our workplaces. My hypothesis then is that, in many cases, we compensate for the areas of life we cannot control by sabotaging the areas of life we have full control over (the poorer your state of mind, the more self-sabotaging you are). Consider how many times you have found yourself indulging in an unhealthy snack to compensate for a frustrating day in the office.

Why are habits important? 

If you agree that we are what we spend the majority of our days doing, then nothing is more important than habits.

How to form better habits?

1) Decide you want to form better habits. This might sound obvious, but it is anything but. In the modern day, people are frenzied and busy. Companies and products are in relentless competition for our attention. The result is that we feel as though life happens to us. We feel like robots in autopilot. A health shock tends to be one thing that inspires stillness.

If you can lift your head above water and contemplate where you would like to dedicate your mental energy, you can make intentional decisions around what matters to you and where to spend your energy/time. The only way to live a healthier life is to decide that that is what you want. If you rather not, expend your energy in pursuit of something that you do feel is a priority. Revisit healthy living when you are ready. For your sake, don’t take too long!  

2) Adopt a heuristics approach. Humans optimise for the path of least resistance. In other words, we try to find shortcuts for everything. It’s in our nature. This has typically been seen as incongruent with healthy living, which often involves paths full of resistance (pun intended).

In my opinion, our nature is a strength. If you have decided that healthy living is something you prioritise, the next step is to harness a lazy heuristic/mental shortcut. Are you the kind of person that sticks to habits (when most people might be tempted to break them), or are you the kind of person that shirks them? Consider this real-world example. Anytime you are about to exercise, you could weigh all the pros and cons (“it’s good for me… but I did have a long meeting”). This requires you to expend mental energy. Humans don’t like that. Good thing then that you decided you are the type to stick to habits. That makes you much more likely to attend your class because your schedule dictates you should.

Another critical advantage of this internal dialogue is that, if practiced consistently enough, you will find that you start to define your identity by these actions. You will soon start to self-identify as the “type of person” who looks after their health. This makes non-compliance even more unlikely.

3) Accept you will stumble sometimes. Above we considered how powerful it can be to work with your nature as opposed to trying to fight it. In that same spirit, you must accept that no matter how noble your efforts, life will sometimes get in the way of habit compliance. Accepting this fact is critical. When we fail to do so, and we find ourselves forced out of a good habit streak, we might conclude that the habit was never viable anyway, so why bother investing in it. If we have accepted failure is part of the process, we can get back on track once the dust settles. After all, it is who we chose to be.

Recognising how hard habits are to form, be protective of them. You can do this in two ways. Minimise time spent not practising habits you have decided to pursue. Secondly, scrutinise what is an event worth breaking a habit for. Often it can be unequivocal, like a car accident. Forgetting your gym shoes at home, however, is not worth breaking the sanctity of the contract you have with yourself. Remember, the more you shirk a habit, the easier it is to continue to do it.

4) Have others hold you to account. Socialise your ambitions and habits. Tell a friend you are committing to a new routine. Doing so enables you to harness the power of social dynamics and pressures, for good. In the same way that peer pressure can guide poor behaviours in disenfranchised youths, the fear of failing in front of a friend or family can be a powerful deterrent to breaking habits you have chosen to nurture. It is no surprise that fitness apps like Strava leverage our aversion to being perceived negatively to inspire persistence with their product. Please note however that, social dynamics are a necessary, but insufficient requirement for maintaining good habits.  

I hope this guide inspires you to build better habits you can live by and carry into old age.