Habits for Wellbeing by Ben Harper

Biting your nails, picking your nose, going to bed too late, putting things off – what is your worst habit?

A habit is anything we do regularly without really thinking. They are the things that become part of our routine, form part of our normal ‘operating system’, or ‘default settings’. When we think of habits, we often think about them being negative things that we do; things we dislike in ourselves and others, but can’t help. But habits can be good too; think about the habit of drinking two litres of water every day, or choosing the healthy food options in the supermarket.

When it come to our wellbeing, we will all have good and bad habits. One of my bad habits is checking social media whenever I have a moment of ‘dead time’. One of my better habits is looking for reasons to be grateful in any given situation.

Because habits are mostly involuntary actions, we might not even realise we’re doing them. We may consider them normal, standard practise and assume everyone else does the same thing. But any regular pattern of behaviour has been learnt over time.

Forming new habits, good or bad is very possible. Our brains are very open to been rewired if we so choose. But is takes time. Some suggest 21 days of doing something consistently will guarantee a changed ‘operating system’, new ‘default settings’, new behaviours becoming a standard part of our routine. 

It’s thought that the best way to stop a bad habit is to replace it with it a new more healthy habit rather than just leave a gap in our routine. So rather than biting your nails, eat a mint every time you get the urge. Or every time you  notice yourself speaking negatively to yourself, counteract it with  a more positive alternative.

Our wellbeing could undoubtedly be improved by eliminating some bad habits and taking up some new better ones. We’re unlikely to be successful at this if we try to change too many things at the same time though. The key might be to focus on changing just one thing….

You may already be really clear about what habit you could change to improve your wellbeing. If not, here are a few suggestions of habits that might be good and bad for our wellbeing:

Take a few moments to consider now…

As you think through the things you do regularly, which things are less helpful to your wellbeing? If you could stop doing that thing, what difference would it make to you? What difference would it make to others around you? What would it take for you to stop doing that thing?

What would be a healthier alternative? If you could start doing that one thing, what difference would it make to you? What difference would it make to others around you? What would it take to start doing that thing?

Could you commit to your new habit for 21 days and see what happens?