The Lazy Genius Podcast - #296 - How to Lazy Genius Your Habits

Episode Date: January 9, 2023

It is January, and we have that fresh start energy, right? Today, we won’t deep dive on habits because this is a podcast episode, but maybe you don’t need a deep dive. You just need a reminder or two as you move into the new year. Let’s gain some perspective on habits as we begin or end them.   Helpful Companion Links Episode 295: How to Start Fresh Without Starting Over Atomic Habits by James Clear Bonus Episode: How I Read 120 Books This Year (2022) Get The Lazy Genius Way or The Lazy Genius Kitchen wherever books are sold! Download a transcript of this episode.   This podcast is hosted by Kendra Adachi and executive produced by Kendra Adachi, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi there. You're listening to the Lazy Genius Podcast. I'm Kendra Adachi and I'm here to help you be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. Today is episode 296. How to Lazy Genius Your Habits. It is January and we have that fresh start energy, right? If you miss last week's episode, How to Start First First Without Starting Over, I highly encourage that one too. That habits are a thing. Habits make up your life whether you realize it or not. There is obviously, a preeminent resource on habits that you've probably read, along with the other 10 million people who have called Atomic Habits by James Clear. If you want to deep dive in Habitside is a great one. That book is one of the few productivity books that I genuinely enjoyed from start to finish. It was so helpful. And I didn't get frustrated or overwhelmed or mad when I read it. The only thing I'll note, if you do read it, is that there are a lot of examples that were of men instead of women. And there was a significant focus on the body. Habits to as like, quote, losing weight to improve your dating prospects.

That did not sit well with me for obvious reasons. But other than that, it's a really great book. There is a reason it is sold like crazy pants. So if you want to deep dive on habits, specifically, that resource is excellent. And I will reference it today. But we will not deep dive today because this is a podcast episode. We don't have time for that. And maybe you also don't need a deep dive.

You know, you just need a reminder or two as you move into the new year. I want to offer some perspective on habits as you begin or end them. I will share James Clear's atomic habit principles, as well as some of my favorite Lacey genus principles that apply specifically to habits. I want this episode to leave you feeling grounded and encouraged about your relationship with habits, not like supercharged and like motivated but also a little anxious at the same time, you know? We don't need more of that energy at the start of the year.

so we are going to keep this as lazy genius as possible. So let's begin with what a habit is. What is a habit? I mean, we know, but do we actually know? If you asked me on the fly to define habit, I would probably say it's something you repeat every day. Simple enough. Also, I have a lot of negative feelings towards the word.

I don't know if you're like me, but habits are often integrated with concepts, I don't love concepts like New Year, New You and big resolutions and diet culture and things that are meant to optimize and mechanize our lives so we can become a certain kind of person. In my mind, habits have been co-opted by the productivity and wellness industries as a weapon rather than a tool. Now, is that true across the board of every person who ever talks about habits? absolutely not. No, not everybody who is involved in wellness and productivity is out to get us either, not by a long shot. But when I started to define habits for myself, I felt this tightness in my chest,

a tightness that is absolutely connected to my experience of when habits were weaponized for something that didn't matter to me. Now, you might not have that same response, right? We all have different responses to different things. But I also think it's a good idea to have a refreshed perspective on what something is, even if your current perspective is not a negative one, especially for something as pervasive as a habit. So I looked up the official definition of habit. And good old Webster says it's a settled and regular tendency or practice, especially one that is hard to give up. So I want to break this down a bit. First, settled. It's a settled and regular tendency or practice. To me, settled, settled is a beautiful word.

I know we're not supposed to settle for like disengaged partners or unequal pay, but my response in general to the word settled, especially in this case, is positive. It's calm and soft and grounded. To have something in your life that is settled can be very positive and comforting. Now, are there things that are settled in your life that you wish weren't? Of course, and we'll get to that. but in general, when something is settled, there is quite often peace instead of trying and striving and constant evaluation.

Just peace. The next part of the definition is it's a settled and regular tendency or practice, a regular tendency or practice. The most important thing I think to notice here is that all three of those words, regular tendency and practice are not hard and fast all or nothing words. There is a softness in all of them. Regular is often, but not always. Tendency is often, but not always. Practice is often, but not always. The idea of kindness and softness and smallness and ease are built into the definition of a habit. And I think that's really lovely.

and probably pretty misunderstood. And then finally, it's a settled and regular tendency or practice, especially one that is hard to give up. Hard to give up. Now, that phrase when I read it made me go, huh? And why? Why is that? I realize that my posture towards habits is that they are something to force yourself to do,

not something you would have a hard time giving it. That is also very comforting to me. So a habit is a settled and a thing. and regular tendency or practice that can be hard to give up. Now, the difficulty in giving it up could be that the habit is so essential and lovely in your life that you wouldn't want to give it up. Or, on the flip side, it could be that it's so automatic and easy. And even though you don't love what it does for your life, it's just too hard to stop, right?

So here's the part of the episode where I should offer examples. You know, I should be like, for example. And truthfully, I feel pretty hesitant to do that to offer up certain habits as examples of bad habits or habits that you would want to quit because those choices are deeply personal. I would hate. I would hate to share one habit as an example of something that you might want to change and then thereby communicate that everyone should change that habit. I don't want to do that. So I am going to stick with my own personal habits when we need a habit example. I'm just going to share my own stuff throughout this episode and you can remember the essence of everything we do here at the lazy genius collective on the lazy genius podcast. You get to decide what matters.

What matters to me does not have to matter to you and vice versa. So I'll just share examples of my own life and they are not rules or judgments or any of it. Cool. Cool, cool, cool. So now that we have a fresher perspective and what a habit actually is, I want to give you a quick rundown of the basics of habit forming and breaking as presented in the aforementioned atomic habits. Also, James Clear references a ton of research in his book. So these are pretty proven concepts. Okay, the first thing to name is that every habit has four stages. Every single habit you do,

even something as simple as turning on a light when you enter a room, is made up of the following four stages in this particular order. A cue, a craving, a response, and a reward. All right, so here's an example. It's nighttime and I yawn. That is my cue that it's time to go to bed. Now, I want to go to bed in the most comfy way possible. Ultimately, my reward, which is the last step in these four stages, is getting into bed happy and comfy, not like desperate and exhausted. So I crave that. That is my craving. Next comes the response, the actual habit. So I'm queued by my yawn. I crave getting into bed, all clean and cozy. And so my response is I do all my nighttime things, face, teeth, hair, PJs, to get me clean and cozy. It's like, I want to get into. It's like, I want to get into

to, you know when you get into a bed with clean sheets? I'm kind of doing that, but like in reverse. Like, I'm the clean thing, not the sheets. That's like, it matters to me every night. And the reward is that I feel clean and happy and settled as I climb into my comfy bed. It's what I craved and it's what I got. My response got me there. Now, what I just described is actually more of a routine than one specific habit. But it is a routine made up of many habits. And really, that's what a routine is. It's made up of a bunch of habits. Brushing my teeth, going through my skincare routine, where I double cleanse and I put on my retinol, changing out of the clothes that I've worn all day, brushing my hair, all of those actions

aren't settled, regular practices that I find very hard to give up. I feel weird if I go to bed without doing those things. I don't want to stop doing those things. They are very rewarding to me. And that is the whole thing about habits. We do them because there is a reward at the other end. So that is the order that every habit goes through. Cue, craving, response, reward. We'll be right back. Aw, isn't something we need to travel for. It's something waiting for us in everyday life, whether in a city street or a moment with a work of art. I'm Dr. Keltner, host of the Science of Happiness podcast. join me for Cities of Aw, a special series on how our public spaces can spark awe, wonder, and enhance the quality of public life. You can find us wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Now, once you understand those four stages of a habit, James Clear has two paths you can take here. One is for making new habits, and the other is for breaking old ones. if you want to create a new habit, you need to make the cue obvious. If you want to break an old habit, you want to make the cue invisible. So obvious if you want it, invisible if you don't. What about the craving? The second stage of a habit. You're craving the reward, right?

Even the tiniest habits have a reward. If you want to create a new habit, make the craving attractive. If you want to break an old one, make the craving unattractive. For the response, to make a new habit, make the response easy. And for breaking an old one, make the response difficult. And for the reward, if you want to keep the habit, make the reward satisfying. It actually does satisfy you. That craving is satisfying.

And if you want to get rid of the habit, make the reward unsatisfying. So, cue, craving, response, reward. If you want to start a new habit, make the craving. cue obvious, the craving attractive, the response easy, and the reward satisfying. If you want to stop an old habit, make the cue invisible, the craving unattractive, the response difficult, and the reward unsatisfying. And I will say for breaking an old habit, even if you throw like a wrench in just one of those four stages, it'll strongly eliminate the desire to keep the habit going. Like if you eliminate one of those things, you kind of

eliminate the habit decently. Okay, so that is the breakdown of how James Clear presents habits. Okay, we're done with James Clear. On paper, it's actually pretty clear. It is. The difficulty comes in actually naming what habits you want to stop or start and then actually doing them. You can know how habits work. But until you apply that knowledge to your own habits, you'll keep on trucking the way you always have because that is. is the very nature of habits. You just keep trucking because they're so automatic. So let's do that next. Let's figure out how to apply this knowledge and figure out what habits you really care about. Now, I would venture to say that most habits you want to start or stop. They are rooted in something

bigger than the habit. They are connected to a larger goal. Most habits are not singular in nature. So here's an example for my own life. Now, I love reading. Y'all know this. Reading is my very favorite hobby. And at the start of 2022, I named that I wanted to read even more than I already did. I shared this process in a recent episode titled How I Read 120 books this year. And y'all, that happened because of habits.

I had a big, loose goal of reading more. But I didn't have specifics for that. And I actually didn't want specifics. I did not make this a smart goal where it's specific and measurable and all the other letters in the acronym. I just wanted to feel like I was reading more than I currently was. So I started the more settled and regular habit of reading instead of listening to a podcast. going on Instagram or watching TV. Now listen to me. I love podcasts. I love Instagram. I love TV with my whole heart. And I did not stop any of those completely, not by a long shot. I listened to many

podcasts. I spent many hours on Instagram. I watch TV. But I did have a more regular habit of reading first. And I almost doubled the number of books I read from the previous year because of that settled regular tendency. It became automatic for me after a while to reach for a book or my Kindle or the Kindle app on my phone or to turn on an audiobook, whatever, when I had free time. And it was a habit that supported the broader goal of reading more often than not. I wouldn't have added that habit to my life if reading in the broader sense didn't matter. Another example, from my own life is that I've been working on for years and years and years and years, is the larger goal of having a reasonably tidy main living area most of the time.

A reasonably tidy living area most of the time is something that is deeply attractive and satisfying to me. But in order for that to become something that exists in my life consistently, I need a habit to get there, right? I need some sort of settled regular practice that happens most of the time to lead me in the direction of a reasonably tidy living area. It's not going to just happen. So I've had the habit for years now of tidying before my kids' afternoon screen time. Almost without fail, my kids have screen time around 4.30 every day. Obviously, that will change as they grow older, but for now it's where we are. And it's where we've been for a while. And before they have that screen time, we

tidy the L. If you've been around here for a while, you know that phrase. Our main living area is in the shape of an L. And so everybody tidies the L before screen time. That's what I say. It's time tidy the L. It's become such a habit for them that I barely have to say anything before screen time to remind them to do it. Sometimes they just do because they know they'll have to. Now that took years, years. But at this point, it's a habit for all of us. And for the most part, that time. That time. tidiness, it seeps into the evening because they rarely trash the place in the hours of like dinner and bedtime, you know, I would be devastated if that family habit went away. It would be very hard to stop it because it is so rewarding and it is so satisfying. So the cue is that the kids

start asking me if they can have screen time, right? Then the craving for me is a tidy space when they're off doing their own thing so I can do mine in calm and calmness. The response is tidying one particular area with clear expectations. And the reward? My kids are contributing to a tidy house. They are part of a family dynamic. The space is relaxing to me. And I did not have to do it myself.

It is a tremendous habit. I love it so much. So your habits are linked to a larger goal. Like kind of always. Now, when we talk about larger goals, what are we really saying? We're naming what matters. Everything always comes back to that to naming what matters. It is imperative, you guys, imperative that you honestly and intentionally look at your larger

goals that are impacting your habits and you make sure that those goals actually matter to you, to you, not to someone else, to you. I believe that the most important thing that you can do to live a fulfilling life is name what matters to you. The answer to that will change across seasons and life stages. If the question is really small, it'll change across days. But ultimately asking and answering that question, it is the foundation of living a life you love to live. What matters most to you right now about this one thing? what matters in your home, in your schedule, in your body, in your relationships, in your experiences day to day.

When you name what matters most, you can identify a larger goal that you might have for six months, six years. But in order to get there, what do you do? You start small. And there it is, right? You start small and you build one habit at a time. you slowly and intentionally make settled regular choices, not all or nothing choices, but settled regular choices that lead you in a direction that matters to you. Start small is 100% my favorite lazy genius principle related to habits.

If we look at James Clear's research about habits, in order to have the response required, in order to do the actual habit, what do you have to do? you have to make it easy. You have to make the response easy. And the easiest steps are the small ones. So start small. I have been more intentional about applying small steps to my life in a meaningful direction for the last like seven to ten years or so. And I love my life. I really do. Is it perfect? That is laughable and that's not even a thing. Are there challenges and conflict and stress? Of course there are. But because of small steps over a long period of time, I have a lot of regular, settled tendencies and practices that create a structure in my life that I love, that means

something to me, that support what matters most to me and my family. It is worth it to start small. You hear me? It's worth it to start small because small steps are easy. Easy steps are sustainable. sustainable steps are repeatable. And then you create a habit that supports a bigger goal that really matters to you. So start small. It works. Over time, it really, really works. We'll be right back.

So as we wrap up today, let's recap. We need a perspective refresh on habits. At least I did. Habits are not bad. Habits are not just for geniuses. Habits are part of all of our lives. And having a more realistic, kinder definition of them, literally the definition of the dictionary, is really helpful. And as you think about adding or taking away habits in your own life, remember that there is a scientific structure to how habits work.

They all involve a cue, a craving, a response, and a reward. How you interact with those four steps, it will determine whether the habit sticks around. So if you want to start a new habit, make the cue obvious, the craving attractive, the response easy, and the reward satisfying. If you want to stop an old habit, make the cue invisible, the craving unattractive, the response difficult, and the reward unsatisfying. But why start or stop habits at all? habits are the building blocks of the larger vision we have for our lives.

If you have any kind of goal, you need a habit to get there. And while there are absolutely ways to create and end habits, I'm here to remind you that it is vitally important that you pay attention to that larger goal. Does it really matter to you? I mean really. What does matter to you? What do you truly believe will bring your life grateful?

fulfillment and purpose and joy in the season that you're in. Consider the habits that get you to those places. Don't just stop or start habits because someone else is or you think you should. If you pay attention to a habit without seeing its place in the bigger picture, you're potentially wasting energy on something that doesn't actually matter to you. James Clear says that habits are a process, not an event. I love that. I know this group has a big old love-hate relationship of processes.

like we love them because we're smart enough to know that they work, but processes are too slow for our liking most of the time, especially when we're stressed. So just remember that habits are a process. And speaking of stress, one thing I did not mention before is that in the research done by James Clear and the folks that he referenced in atomic habits, the habits that people wanted to end were all rooted in being stressed or bored. Stress and boredom are the originators. of habits, we probably would rather release. So as you think through your own habits, remember that. I think it's just a helpful lens as you name what's working and what isn't. And if you have a habit that you have developed out of stress or boredom, don't just end it. Replace it. The reason you

exercise that habit is because there's a reward there. You will not do something repeatedly unless there's a reward. So rather than taking the reward away, replace the response, the thing you do with something more beneficial to you that still offers a similar reward. For example, back to my reading. Podcasts, Instagram, and TV, they all give me great rewards of entertainment, right? But I do prefer the entertainment of reading. So I began shifting my response from turning something on on my phone to grabbing a book instead. I'm still being rewarded just with something that generally matters more. So don't just eliminate, replace and start small. Please, oh please, please, please, please, please, please, please start small. Now, three other really practical lazy genius principles that

you could apply to habits are decide once, batch it, and build the right routines. I devote entire chapters to those principles in my book, The Lazy Genius Way. So if you have not read it, now is a lovely time of year to do so. But one other principle I want to mention that it needs less explanation than the other three, but it needs way more practice, is the final principle in my book, be kind to yourself. As you go through any sort of thinking or journaling or listening in order to name your goals or start or stop your habits, please, please be kind to yourself. you're not something to be fixed. You're not a problem to solve.

You're not like Maria in sound of music. Your life is not a hot mess, even if you think it is. Because listen to me, hot mess is not determined by our circumstances. It's determined by our perspective and our response. If you have a posture of frustration and discontentment and unkindness towards yourself and your life, you won't get anywhere. Not anywhere good, at least. So please, throughout this process, be kind to yourself.

And at the risk of sounding like the end of a full house episode, that might be the best habitable. Be kind to yourself. Gag. And also true. Also true. And that is how to lazy genius your habits. Before we go, let's celebrate the lazy genius of the week. This week, it's Allison Keyboy, who sent me this message on Instagram.

Hi, Kendra. I wanted to share my wintertime, decide once, act of kindness for those I love. Anytime I'm making a batch of soup, I automatically double or even triple it and give a few containers to family and friends. As the mom of two young kids, it's an easy way for me to add blessing to others into my routine. This is such a lovely simple idea. I know a lot of folks will make extra of certain recipes, sometimes for their own freezer, sometimes for others. But what I love about this idea is that it's an automatic choice about one thing. It is literally something you decide one time and you just keep going. And it's only for soup. You're not making the choice every time you make a meal.

It's for soup, right? And soup is such a great meal to double or triple because it's rarely that much extra work. Also, I cannot imagine a person who is given a container of homemade soup being like, me, I'm fine. Like soup is the most comforting food in the world. And even if it's not large enough for a family's dinner, like to get, you know, you didn't make enough soup to give a family for their entire dinner or they've got picky kids or something. It's for sure like a great lunch for some folks. This is just a really, really great idea that can vary depending on the person in the choice.

But it makes so much sense. Like just make extra soup and give it to people. It's never a bad idea. So thank you for sharing this with us, Allison, and congratulations on being the lazy genius of the week. Okay, y'all, that's it for today. Thank you so much for listening. And until next time, be a genius about the things that matter and lazy about the things that don't. I'm Kendra.

I'll see you next week. Have you ever felt like you were living just a B or B plus life? It's so dangerous to live that more dangerous than a B minus or a C plus life because when you're living a B or B plus life, you don't change it. You think it's good enough. Is it? I'm Susie Welch. I host a podcast called Becoming You. People think, okay, an A-plus life is not available to me, but there is a way.

We are all in the process of becoming ourselves. Listen to Becoming You wherever you get your podcasts.