Morning Routine For Successful People + Personal Development Planner 2/2

The Habit Loop: How Habits Work

The book begins with the story of Eugene Pauly, a 71-year-old man who lost the medial temporal lobe of his brain to viral encephalitis. The rest of Eugene’s brain remained perfectly intact, and he had no problem remembering anything that occurred prior to 1960 – but suffered from total short-term memory loss, unable to retain knowledge of any new event for more than a minute and constantly repeating his words and actions from a minute before. Eugene had no memory of his grandchildren, and couldn’t even tell you where his kitchen or bedroom was located, even when he was sitting in his own home.

However, in an effort to make sure Eugene got some exercise, his wife had begun taking him on a walk around the block each day. She became frantic one day when he disappeared, only to show up 15 minutes later after taking the walk by himself. He couldn’t draw a simple map of his block or even tell you where his house was, but he began taking that same walk around the block every day. Eugene had demonstrated what scientists had suspected but never before proved: that habits are formed and operate entirely separately from the part of the brain responsible for memory. Later tests confirmed that we learn and make unconscious choices without having to remember anything about the lesson or decision making.

Your brain is constantly seeking new ways to save effort, and is always “chunking” sequences of actions into automatic routines. Backing out of the driveway, for example, requires over a dozen separate actions, but many of us do it daily without a second thought.

The habit process consists of a three-step loop:

The Power of Habit summary

Cue. A trigger that tells your brain to go into automatic mode, and which routine to use.
Routine. Physical, mental, or emotional behavior that follows the cue.
Reward. A positive stimulus that tells your brain that the routine works well, and is worth remembering.

Simply understanding how habits work make them much easier to control. By learning to observe the cues and rewards, we can change the routines.