How to break bad habits

A research conducted at a hospital in Boston aiming to make the workers there have healthy eating habits and cut out the consumption of unnecessary products like fast food and soft drinks by placing the sodas in one refrigerator and placing bottled waters in different refrigerators yielded the following result. The consumption of soft drinks decreased by 11.7% while consumption of bottled water increased drastically by 25.8%. It can be concluded that unhealthy habits can be influenced and broken by our environment.

How does our environment influence us as individuals? Our environment changes the way we behave and choose. For instance, a person cannot be expected to behave in the same way he does while he is in a church or religious setting as he does while in a public place. Another example is our preference when we want to grab coffee. We immediately choose the well known coffee places with brands not because of their coffee having better quality, but because we see the brand everywhere.

To develop good habits, we must create reminders where they can be seen easily. For example, if we want to make a habit of reading books before going to bed, we must place the book on the bed after making it so when we go to sleep we are reminded of the book we wanted to read. To break bad habits, therefore, we must do the opposite. Place the thing you want to break your habit from out of sight and with obstacles. For instance, to break the habit watching too much TV, place it away from the front and unplug all the cables and wires so the next you think of watching TV, you will be reminded of all the effort you have to put in. changing environments is also a good way to break a bad habit.