“First forget inspiration.
Habit is more dependable.
Habit will sustain you whether you’re inspired or not.
Habit is persistence in practice.”
— Octavia Butler
***
Nothing will change your future trajectory like habits.
We all have goals, big or small things which we want to achieve within a certain time frame.
Some people want to make a million dollars by the time they turn 30. Some want to lose 20lb before summer. Some want to write a book in the next 6 months. When we begin to chase an intangible or vague concept (success, wealth, health, happiness) making a tangible goal is often the first step.Habits are processes operating in the background that powers our lives. Good habits help us reach our goals. Bad ones hinder us. Either way habits powerfully influence our automatic behavior.
The difference between habits and goals is not semantic. Each requires different forms of action. For example:
- We want to learn a new language. We could decide we want to be fluent in 6 months (goal), or we could commit to 30-minutes of practice each day (habit.)
- We want to read more books. We could set the goal to read 50 books by the end of the year, or we could decide to always carry one (habit.)
- We want to spend more time with family. We could plan to spend 7 hours a week with family (goal), or we could choose to eat dinner with them each night (habit.)
The Problems With Goals
When we want to change an aspect of our lives, setting a goal is often the logical first step. Despite being touted by many a self-help guru, this approach has some problematic facets.
Goals have an endpoint. This is why many people revert to their previous state after achieving a certain goal. People run marathons, then stop exercising altogether afterward. Or they make a certain amount of money, then fall into debt soon after. Others reach a goal weight, only to spoil their progress by overeating to celebrate.
Goals rely on factors which we do not always have control over. It’s an unavoidable fact that reaching a goal is not always possible, regardless of effort. An injury might derail a fitness goal. An unexpected expense might sabotage a financial goal. A family tragedy might impede a creative output goal. When we set a goal, we are attempting to transform what is usually a heuristic process into an algorithmic one.
Goals rely on willpower and self-discipline. As Charles Duhigg wrote in The Power of Habit:
Willpower isn’t just a skill. It’s a muscle, like the muscles in your arms or legs, and it gets tired as it works harder, so there’s less power left over for other things.
Keeping a goal in mind and using it to direct our actions requires constant willpower. During times when other parts of our lives deplete our supply, it can be easy to forget it. For example, the goal of saving money requires self-discipline each time we make a purchase. Meanwhile, the habit of putting $50 in a savings account weekly requires little effort. Habits, not goals, make otherwise difficult things easy.
Goals…
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