BONUS: Strategies for consistent habits

In this bonus episode of Shift Happens, we focus on practical strategies to build consistent habits and create lasting change. Following on from our previous discussion on consistency and discipline, we break down simple, actionable tools you can start using straight away.

We cover habit stacking, building micro habits, creating supportive environments, using rewards, and developing flexible systems that help you stay on track — even when motivation drops. We also explore how to overcome common barriers like perfectionism, stress, and all-or-nothing thinking.

If you’re looking for realistic, sustainable ways to stay consistent and build habits that actually stick, this episode gives you the tools to get started.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Okay, so for anyone who is listening, um uh what would be some of the strategies that you would advise? How would you so for instance, a really classic one that people mention would be make it appealing. Whatever you want to do, like make it really desirable for you to want to do it. Buy yourself a nice new gym set, you know, so that you feel really good in it, or some really comfy shoes so you're not getting blisters, whatever it is, just make it really attractive to want to do that thing.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

So you want to, yeah, of course, make it attractive, make your environment accept like your environment um embrace that habit. Yeah. They actually had a really interesting experiment, I suppose, where they um in during the war in Vietnam, the veterans, a lot of them took drugs because it was available out there in Vietnam, opium, yeah. When they came back to the US, um the ones who lived in households where there was a lot of support, PTSD, um like help and yeah, uh support, families, et cetera, totally went off the drugs. And those who didn't have that, yeah, or who went back into like dysfunctional households where they had no support, where no one to talk to, et cetera, uh stayed in drugs. I don't know about opium, but stayed addicted to drugs. Okay. So the impact environment has is huge. Yes. Huge. So curate your environment. Even to the level of like highly addictive drugs, essentially. So imagine what you can do on non-addictive drugs.

SPEAKER_01 1:47

So curate your environment to facilitate that new habit. Yeah. And this kind of goes back to you have curated an environment to curate sorry, you curated a previous environment to support a habit that you're trying to change. So do the same with the new habit that you want to do. Um habit stacking is another really good way. You know, giving that cue, you know, after you have your cup of coffee, you do your meditation.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Like meditation with the LED mask. Did that work with it?

SPEAKER_01 2:16

Like exactly. Not for me, but it worked for you. And so, you know, finding ways that you can stack something on I think is another really good tip. Yeah. Um the other one is um making something like combining it with something that you find really desirable. Yeah. So I often say to clients, you know, if you want to get moving more, try and incorporate, you know, three or two 10-minute walks in your day, listen to your favorite podcast, potentially shift happens, whilst you're doing that.

SPEAKER_00 2:50

What if they want a milkshake from MS, uh from uh McDonald's? When what? When walking. When walking.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

I mean, if you if the goal is to start walking, then yeah, do that. Like, I mean, if you're wanting to do that, you want to make flurry whilst you walk. Well, if the goal is that you want to keep get walking, sure. Okay. If your goal is that you find it not like a complex, that's not a very compatible one. That might be a bit of a sum zero-sum game.

SPEAKER_00 3:18

I would also say then on that basis is incorporate flexibility.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

Incorporate flexibility and a plan B. What are other ways you can achieve?

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Yeah, if you're not walking, what are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 3:31

Cycling.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Yeah, but that exactly, like me, I'm going to the gym, I can just walk my treadmill just by entering the building.

SPEAKER_01 3:38

Or if you don't have time to go to the gym, can you walk to work? So that it's not something that takes you necessarily a significantly amount more time.

SPEAKER_00 3:45

I also sometimes think this, I don't know if it works for everyone, but it's also like the idea of your future self, like doing something for your future self. So I had a window today, for example, of going to the gym, but then I had a couple of clients before we had this uh session, and I was like, oh, do I just forget the gym, go and get ready, um and then have a few extra hours to, you know, not few, not that I would spend hours at the gym, but like that extra 45 minutes to take my time. Yeah, you know. Only there for three hours. Exactly. No, it was it was like a window of like 45 minutes, or do I just um still do it, get it done, and then carry on with my day as planned. And one of the things I do think is I know it will actually make me feel better, not going in, not necessarily being on the treadmill. I also had forgotten my ear pods, which was a big decider. So I was like, I'm actually gonna have to just do this without any White Knuckle it. Yeah. And I just thought, no, you know what? I think my client meetings and my the the rest of my day will actually be nicer if I do it. Yeah. So I kind of thought of that. Yeah. Because I thought, plus, I get to keep it in my diary, so I don't have to remove it.

SPEAKER_01 4:57

The main motivator.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

It's a little bit like the reward though. Yeah. And the thing, the thought of, no, I will feel better. I know it's it's not hard enough that it's gonna kill me or exhaust me. It's enough that it will make me feel motivated. And so your future self, like what are your what is the kind of get that that dopamine hit from the act of doing it.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

But that's kind this kind of goes back to the identity piece. Because you are someone who feels better when they exercise. Yeah. It's not, oh, I will lose weight or I will look better, or it's more that's just who you are.

SPEAKER_00 5:31

Well, I'm not gonna lie, I think if I was putting on weight whilst I was doing it, I probably wouldn't do it. Like the element of getting fit is helpful as well. Like, otherwise, no. I do no, I do I do think I I it's not that I want to necessarily lose weight, but I want to be healthy.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

No, no, no, I know. But my point being is that the the end you weren't just aiming for like a goal, like this walk is gonna need to.

SPEAKER_00 5:51

It was what is it gonna how is it gonna benefit another part of my day which is important to me? Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

And how's it gonna benefit you and yourself and how you feel? Yeah. I feel like that's identifying.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

So it's like you're yes, but it's like you're doing something now that your future self will say thank you. Yeah. There's that kind of like You did it? Did you get the thank you? Um I suppose so, yeah, because I I I'm just I don't regret doing it. And I I think it made my day. I mean, I suppose you never know how it's gonna Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:19

But that's good. I mean, it's ultimately you will never really go wrong going for a walk. I always say like I've very rarely heard of instances where you feel worse after a while.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

I suppose I could have broken my ankle falling off the treadmill. Yeah, that might have worked.

SPEAKER_01 6:35

Always always looking on the bright side.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

But I didn't. Then you would have been consistently. There was a guy next to me. I'm not joking, he was holding on to the handles like for dear life. And I looked, I peered over, he had 9.9, which is quite hard. And he was holding on, like, was from those cartoons where the person's there, and then the legs are like spinning and spinning and spinning. And I did think, oh my gosh, he might have to pull the emergency. He made running look so painful that I thought, yeah, he might actually.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

This might be the only time he does this.

SPEAKER_00 7:10

He might be the only time he does this, but but congratulations on the willpower because that was pure willpower. That was pure pure devotion. That was like really, really impressive. He's got really strong. Someone told him you've got to run X amount a day or a week or whatever. And he was just doing it, and it looked really painful.

SPEAKER_01 7:31

I think that's also another interesting one is like try and figure out like what are the things that drive you. I had um quite similar to you, but a patient once who loved ticking things off a list, and that's how she built in because she was like, What's it the um what's not the word?

SPEAKER_00 7:47

Not recognition, the reward bit. I think you have to. I mean, James Clear is quite clear about this, is that you have to look at the reward.

SPEAKER_01 7:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

So because that is what's ultimately going to drive you to do something or not doing something. Yeah. So for me, the reward certainly is I love the ticking bit, I love the feeling.

SPEAKER_01 8:05

But you get to find that. What is that for you? Is it self-competit is it competitive competing against others, competing against yourself?

SPEAKER_00 8:12

No, I just think it's in my personality, I like getting things done and ticking.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

No, no, but it's finding that for yourself, right? It's it's how you find that um intrinsically that it's gonna help drive you.

SPEAKER_00 8:23

And that's probably why I am a list person.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:26

Because I'm someone who has post-its everywhere, lists everywhere, and that works for me because I like getting things done.

SPEAKER_01 8:31

Yeah, you can just tick it off. Yeah. Um and then I think the final piece I'm gonna say to this whole like how to is start small. Yeah. I think this cannot be overstated, but genuinely, if you are trying to do something absolutely new for the first time, like do not set yourself up for failure by trying to do too much too quickly, you know, and unachievably. And I think this is where sometimes frustration can really occur, especially when someone is paying for a service like a dietitian or a coach. Oh, yeah, they hate it. Because they're they don't feel like they're advancing. Exactly. But already sometimes just the fact that you're making that space for bigger things to come later is in itself like that groundwork. And I, you know, I will say, I the number of times I've said to people, okay, you want to increase your fibre intake, just add two tablespoons of mixed seeds to one meal a day. That's it. Yeah, and you still can't do that. So then you think, okay, well, you know, forget about cooking whole meals and dishes that have high fibre intake. If you cannot do something as simple as that on a consistent basis, then you know, it's and that's this is the level that you kind of need to start with when you're gonna be able to do that.

SPEAKER_00 9:56

Yeah, no, I do agree with that. I do agree with that, and it's a pretty hard sell, to be honest, to keep someone motivated when you're trying to get them to keep at the small environmental changes, but it is important, otherwise it's it's too overwhelming to do everything like that.

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Exactly. And I do think that there is a cost to um someone not able to keep up with a um with a new habit. Because I think when someone can't keep up with a new habit, I feel like that takes a little bit of their self-esteem because that then reinforces that narrative of I can't do something consistently, I'm a failure, I'm someone who's stuck in this rut. And I think and so if you know, if you're already setting yourself up to failure, it's not actually oh, you'll come off net zero from where you started, if it doesn't work out, you might actually end up slightly worse position from a mental point of view. No, but I would say for anyone who's who's thinking of taking on a new habit, the risk of you trying to take on too much too quickly.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

Right, yes, that's why break it down.

SPEAKER_01 11:10

Break it down because actually if you're taking if you're trying to take too big of a bite out of something and then you can't achieve it for obvious reasons, you're gonna make you feel worse about it and reduce your chances of actually trying again at another time or for something different. Yeah. So I do think there's actually a cost to the basic.

SPEAKER_00 11:30

Yes, your self-esteem, yeah, you know, self-confidence.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

Exactly. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:35

I agree. I think so very much. That's actually something I do say to people in a way to try and sell the bite-size bit, because I do say like the flip side of not of taking on too much is that you don't manage it, and then therefore it makes you I think people, yeah, they hear it, but not necessarily buy into the and then the irony is they usually because they find it too small or insignificant, they stop doing it, and then you're like, okay, well, you struggled even with that.

SPEAKER_01 12:04

So, you know, you kind of have to you have to prove to yourself that you can do something consistently, even though we all do something consistently. Something positive. But something positive consistently, to then kind of feed that narrative that that it is something that's achievable.

SPEAKER_00 12:21

Definitely agreed.