Over time, this habit loop – cue, routine, reward – becomes more and more automatic. “The cue and reward become intertwined in such a way that a powerful sense of anticipation and craving emerges,” writes Duhigg. It is this craving that powers the habit loop and gives habits their strength.

The craving brain: how habits are powered

You need something more than yourself, something more than your willpower to get through such moments. And that something is belief.People who believe in something bigger than themselves can always admit their powerlessness and find comfort in the fact that there’s someone beside them at all times.Without belief, a reworked habit loop is only as lasting as life is kind. But to turn the new habit loop into permanent behavior, you must introduce some kind of belief in your life.It doesn’t have to include God – a friend might do just as well.

The bad news is twofold.First of all, the basal ganglia is quite primitive, so it is unable to tell the difference between bad and good habits.The only thing it understands are rewards in the present: if it doesn’t get them now, it will turn against you until you obey its will.

The golden rule of habit change

Fortunately, there is some good news as well.Namely, even though you can never truly extinguish your bad habits by doing away with the habit loop – you can undeniably short-circuit it and transform your bad habits into good ones.All you need to do is adhere to a simple instruction, the so-called golden rule of habit change: keep the old cue and deliver the old reward – but insert a new routine in-between.

It’s not easy to change a habit, but with sufficient time and effort, you can unquestionably do it. Just replace the routine but keep the initial cue and the final reward; it doesn’t mind asking some supervision from a friend as well!

Summary

When the cue and reward are automated, we can’t help but hunger after the latter every time we’re exposed to the former.Listening to the tinkling music of a roving ice cream truck creates anticipation of a sugar-fueled joy inside our brain – but also activates a neurological pattern associated with desire and frustration.If you don’t get that vanilla-flavored ice-cream in a cone or a dish, the joy turns into a craving that, if left unsatisfied, drives you to anger and depression.

In the case of strong habits, wanting evolves into an obsessive craving that forces our brains into autopilot, “even in the face of strong disincentives, including loss of reputation, job, home, and family.”This is why some people can’t help but cheat their significant others or gamble away their family’s savings. Unless they don’t do that, their brains will go into overdrive with anger and frustration, getting hold of their entire bodies.

Secondly, the habit loop is just too powerful to be broken apart.You can try to get rid of a bad habit as much as you want to, but the basal ganglia will eventually get the better of you because cravings are much more potent than willpower.It’s like trying to separate powerful magnets: you need a lot of force and energy to keep the cue and the reward apart from each other, but this is both physically and psychologically draining; sooner or later, you’ll grow tired and fall back into the old bad habit once again.

“That’s the rule,” writes Duhigg. “If you use the same cue, and provide the same reward, you can shift the routine and change the habit. Almost any behavior can be transformed if the cue and reward stay the same.The golden rule has influenced treatments for alcoholism, obesity, obsessive-compulsive disorders, and hundreds of other destructive behaviors, and understanding it can help anyone change their own habits.”

Identify the routineSince the routine is the most obvious part of the habit, this is the easiest step.In the case of Duhigg, the habit he wanted to change was going to the cafeteria every afternoon and buying a chocolate chip cookie – a practice that caused him to gain weight.For you, it can be anything from smoking to procrastination to watching too much Netflix.

All habits share a similar pattern by 3 step loop:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">First, there is the external cue, that is, the trigger that tells your brain to go into automatic mode and which habit to use. This can be anything from the familiar music of an ice cream truck to the smell of fresh coffee in the morning. </li><li class="ql-align-justify">Then, there is the routine itself, the most obvious element of a habit, the behavior you wish to change (e.g., nail biting) or reinforce (e.g., taking the stairs instead of the elevator). </li><li class="ql-align-justify">Finally, there is the reward that helps your brain figure out if this particular loop is worth remembering for the future.</li></ul>

Changing habits is neither fast nor easy; however, thanks to the golden rule, you can reshape almost any habit, provided that you dedicate enough time and effort.Since there are so many habits, there isn’t really a single formula for changing them; but the following 4-step framework – though merely a practical guide – is a great place to start:

А 4-step framework for habit change

Experiment with rewards.Now that you’ve identified the routine you want to change, the second step is to discover something far less obvious – the nature of the craving that glues the cue and the reward together.Most cravings are “obvious in retrospect, but incredibly hard to see when we are under their sway,” so, to figure this out, you need to experiment a bit with the rewards.It isn’t really important what you choose to do instead of the routine you want to change: the point is to test different hypotheses to see when the urge will finally be satisfied.

Habit replacement is an amazing life hack. Use it wisely, and in just a few weeks, you can put a bad habit behind and adopt a good one – both in one fell swoop! However, this process of reprogramming has one vital flaw: it works only until the stresses of life get too high.If, for example, you found out your partner was cheating on you or someone you love very much was diagnosed with cancer, chances are you’d immediately fall back to the old loop.

The importance of belief

According to a 2006 paper published by a Duke University researcher, more than 40% of the actions we perform each day aren’t actual decisions, but habits.The reason is simple: our brain is constantly on the lookout for new ways to save energy, so when it notices a sequence of actions with a beneficial result, it converts it in an automatic habit and stores it in a primitive part of the brain called the basal ganglia.

The habit loop: how habits work

Isolate the cueAt this point, you should know both the routine and the reward – in addition to the craving the reward satisfies.What remains is identifying the cue. Almost all habitual cues fit into one of the following five categories: location, time, emotional state, other people, and the action immediately preceding the routine.

Have a planNow it’s time to put the golden rule into practice and come up with a written plan that should help you short-circuit the habit loop.The thing is it was always going to work: as we already said, the basal ganglia is too primitive to distinguish between routines, and its only job is to prime you into doing something to get the reward it wants.So, by keeping the cue and the reward and changing the routine that bridges them, both you and your primitive self win.

Widely considered a classic on the subject, Charles Duhigg’s “The Power of Habit” is a 400-page methodical exploration of the nature and the machinery of our habits. Much more importantly, it is also a manual on how to train yourself out of the bad ones. So, get ready to learn how habits work and how to change the ones you don’t like!

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • This instant classic explores how we can change our lives by changing our habits. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Wall Street Journal • Financial Times In The Power of Habit, award-winning business reporter Charles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. Distilling vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives that take us from the boardrooms of Procter & Gamble to the sidelines of the NFL to the front lines of the civil rights movement, Duhigg presents a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential. At its core, The Power of Habit contains an exhilarating argument: The key to exercising regularly, losing weight, being more productive, and achieving success is understanding how habits work. As Duhigg shows, by harnessing this new science, we can transform our businesses, our communities, and our lives. With a new Afterword by the author   “Sharp, provocative, and useful.”—Jim Collins   “Few [books] become essential manuals for business and living. The Power of Habit is an exception. Charles Duhigg not only explains how habits are formed but how to kick bad ones and hang on to the good.”—Financial Times   “A flat-out great read.”—David Allen, bestselling author of Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity “You’ll never look at yourself, your organization, or your world quite the same way.”—Daniel H. Pink, bestselling author of Drive and A Whole New Mind “Entertaining . . . enjoyable . . . fascinating . . . a serious look at the science of habit formation and change.”—The New York Times Book Review

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Charles Duhigg is an American journalist and non-fiction author. He was a reporter for The New York Times, currently writes for The New Yorker Magazine and is the author of two books on habits and productivity, titled The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business and Smarter Faster Better.

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