Synopsis
James Clear’s book Atomic Habit focuses on extremely practical steps that one can take to alter or create new habits. The name “Atomic Habits” underscores the significance of tiny, seemingly inconsequential actions that ultimately give rise to the realization of our goals. Clear wrote this book as a result of his articles exploding on the internet. He began documenting his personal experiments with habits and published articles every Monday and Thursday. Soon he advanced from being an imposter to the expert on Habit Formation.
Clear starts his book by elaborating the Fundamentals of Tiny Changes in our daily lives. He advocates on being 1% better every day. This discussion at the start of the book is highly intriguing. At first, improving 1% a day could feel like doing no more than your regular chores. Nevertheless, after a year, you will have outcomes that are nearly 37 times better. This stunning graph from the book explains the assertion that things are 37% better while also increasing worse by 1% per day.
Clear goes on to identify three levels of change:
Outcome Change
Process Change
Identity Change
The Identity Change is the most powerful and longest-lasting change. If you convince yourself that you are already who you want to be in the future, your behavior will reflect that belief. Clear outlines a very doable strategy for boosting your conviction: Think of every action as a vote for the kind of person you want to be.
- Each time you write a page, you are a writer.
- Each time you start a workout, you are an athlete.
- Each time you a memorize a page of Quran al Kareem, you are a Hafiz.
This mindset will eliminate any uncertainty or pessimism about your capabilities.
Next, Clear discusses the science behind how habits function. Despite the fact that it could appear that habit formation is subjective, Clear provides the most accurate scientific explanation of the process.
Building a habit can be broken down into four basic steps: cue, craving, response and reward.
If a behavior is insufficient in any of the four stages, it will not become a habit. Eliminate the cue and your habit will never start. Reduce the craving and you won’t experience enough motivation to act. Make the behavior difficult and you won’t be able to do it. And if the reward fails to satisfy your desire, then you’ll have no reason to do it again in the future. This is the Habit Loop.
Interestingly, the four steps can be divided into two phases: the problem phase and the solution phase.
Clear then turns these four steps into a practical framework that can be used to design good habits and eliminate bad ones. He refers to them as the four laws of habit formation.
Whenever you want to change your behavior, you can simply ask yourself:
How can I make it obvious?
How can I make it attractive?
How can I make it easy?
How can I make it satisfying?
In the following chapters, Clear provides easily implementable strategies to start designing your Habits. Here’s a cheat sheet by Clear himself, where he points out all the strategies he has discussed throughout the book.
What strategies have I applied to my daily life?
I created a Habit’s Scoreboard for myself and hung it on my cupboard—the most visible spot in my bedroom. I select 3-4 habits for every month and try to cross them off my list everyday. It motivates me to continue and not break the streak.
Click here to download my Habit Scoreboard template.
“Design your Environment” is another strategy that I’ve tried. I’ve always wanted to be a reader but never had the time or motivation to do so. This environment-design strategy is based on reducing the energy required or friction between you and your habit. I began keeping a book on my table to keep it visible at all times. I’ve read seven books since I read this book last summer.
I’ve also used the Strategy of Implementation Intentions. I kept it as simple as possible. It goes like this “I will read Dua e Kamil first thing when I get to my office and open my laptop” (I use esahifa on my laptop)
To sum it up, this book is like having a wise friend by your side, gently nudging you towards better habits and away from the bad ones. Once you dive into its pages, you’ll start to see your day-to-day life in a whole new light, feeling empowered to make meaningful changes. Trust me, this book has the potential to be a game-changer for anyone looking to live a happier and healthier life.
16 comments
It looks very nice and useful it will help in my daily lifestyle
Thank You! Feel free to share how you have applied the strategies…
The atomic habit name itself boosts me to go through the blog, looking forward to seeing more tips and guidelines, Thank you
Inshallah
congratulations on your first bolg. superb keep it up and may u scale more greater heights.
Thank you so much!
Great work Aliasgar
Thank a lot Murtaza!
Never could convince myself to read a motivational book. May be I will now.
That’s Great! You can definitely start with Atomic Habits.
Agreed, Indeed such an amazing book!!
Great work! The Habit Scoreboard looks really useful and well-thoughtout.
Thank you Huzefa Bhai!
Excellent work.
Thank you Murtaza!
Superb motivated me for so many things congratulations