
Top Mistakes in Behavior Change - benreyes
http://www.slideshare.net/captology/stanford-6401325
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halo
The slides in text form:

1\. Relying on willpower for long-term change

\- Imagine willpower doesn't exist.

2\. Attempting big leaps instead of baby steps

\- Seek tiny successes, one after another

3\. Ignoring how environment shapes behaviors

\- Change your life and change your context

4\. Trying to stop old behaviors instead of creating new ones

\- Focus on action, not avoidance

5\. Blaming failures of lack of motivation

\- Make the behavior easier to do

6\. Underestimating the power of triggers

\- No behavior happens without a trigger

7\. Believing information leads to action

\- We humans aren't so rational

8\. Focusing on abstract goals more than concrete behaviors

\- Abstract: Get in shape. Concrete: Walk 15 min. today

9\. Seeking to changea behavior forever, not for a short time

\- A fixed period works better than "forever"

10\. Assuming that behavior change is difficult.

\- Behavior change is not so hard when you have the right process

Can anyone expand on what they mean by 3 and 6?

~~~
ztan
My 2 cents:

3\. Habits are often formed because of/to adapt the environment. (evolution?)
Hang out with smoker friends all the time, higher chance of becoming a smoker.
Or if you have a door that doesn't shut/lock properly. It could lead you to
form a habit of double checking the door every time you close it. Fixing the
door would probably cause you to lose that habit.

6\. A lot of behaviors are set off by certain triggers. It could be different
for everyone. Smoker trying to quit should probably avoid being at places
where everyone is smoking. AA member probably should avoid going to bars.
Recognizing triggers allow you to avoid things that lead to undesired
compulsive behaviors. At the same time they can be used to create desirable
ones. Perhaps listening to motivational music or phrases will trigger someone
to study and seek self improvement.

~~~
ay
Triggers are very powerful indeed. I'm pretty happy to see this list - since I
nailed probably 6-7 out of them while hacking the smoking habit out of myself
last year.

Coincidentally I've written this up earlier today for one of my friends who's
just 3 days into the journey - and thought to share here as well. If it helps
anyone at all - I'd be happy.

<http://bnpcs.blogspot.com/2011/01/how-to-quit-smoking.html>

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techiferous
I would add:

#11: Not realizing you can't imagine your future accurately.

Some changes you make are so significant it's like you are playing a whole new
game. If you don't realize this, then you will not be a good judge of whether
to make the change.

For example, let's say you enjoy playing basketball. Someone comes up holding
a football and invites you to play football. You don't realize that he's
talking about a new game with new rules and a new environment. You look at his
oddly-shaped ball and imagine yourself trying to dribble that ball down the
court. You conclude that you wouldn't enjoy football.

I've made numerous significant life changes, among them becoming vegan and
going car-free. Both of those decisions are game-changing and so it's really
hard to _imagine_ yourself making those changes; you really have to just try
it for a while before making up your mind.

For veganism, I often hear people say "I could never give up X" or "What do
you eat?". They imagine themselves no longer eating their favorite foods, not
realizing that after adjusting to veganism their palate will change and
they'll have different favorite foods. And they also don't realize the
abundance of vegan foods out there because they've never had an incentive to
look, so they just assume they'd be eating salads all the time.

Ditching my car was another game-changer. I wouldn't recommend doing this
unless you are in a well-designed city. I moved from Norfolk, Virginia to
Boston, Massachusetts and ditched my car in the process. If I had imagined
myself in the environment of Norfolk without a car, I would have never been
tempted to do so. But I had visited Boston and also had lived for a while in
Germany without a car and so I knew what it was like to live in a well-
designed city without a car. Even so, I was pleasantly surprised by the amount
of cost and inconvenience I was getting rid of by not having a car: no more
gas-filling eating away my time and money, no more large key fobs filling up
my pockets, no more having to ask my friends if they know a good mechanic, no
more driving around forever looking for a parking space, etc. etc. All the
inconveniences of owning a car were somewhat invisible beforehand and they
didn't become quite so apparent until after actually ditching the car.

tl;dr: if you're making a significant life change, you can't accurately
imagine what your new situation will be like by extrapolating from your past
experiences.

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j_baker
_Thank you_. Nothing annoys me more than people who blame everything on lack
of willpower and motivation.

~~~
sliverstorm
People who fault themselves for their own failures annoy you? Gee.

~~~
philh
"I want to do that, but I just don't have the willpower" used as an excuse not
to try would get annoying quickly. You don't really want to do it; you just
want to signal like you do.

Faulting yourself is useful iff you subsequently attempt to fix yourself.
Otherwise it's probably counterproductive.

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dkarl
I think "#2 Attempting big leaps instead of baby steps" should be changed.
Attempting big leaps can be very educational and motivational if you're
realistic about the fact that you're going to backslide. Making a big change
for a week or two while you're highly motivated feels great and establishes
some new habits and memories that will be useful to you later when you're
having a hard time. It's also a great opportunity to try out new behaviors
that are unknown and scary to you. When your motivation and interest are not
so high, you will not be able to keep up the changes, but you will benefit
from having removed the uncertainty and the first-time inhibition from your
new behaviors and activities, and your idea of what _you_ can accomplish will
be forever broadened.

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weirdcat
It's like a highly condensed version of Switch
(<http://heathbrothers.com/switch/>, highly recommended)

~~~
midnightmonster
Bought for kindle. Resonates so far, but doesn't seem to have any intention of
telling me how to apply it's wisdom to my actual problems.

~~~
aharrison
After I read most of it, I took some problems I was having and tried to come
up with mappings and methods of approach for fixing them.

Then I showed them to my mentor, and he shot them all down. But practice makes
perfect, fail fast and iterate, or something.

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jcro41
I looked through the site and found this:
<http://www.behaviorwizard.org/wp/behavior-grid/>

It really makes you think about behavior change in a much clearer way.

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Mz
RE: halo's text summary -- the slides themselves are just text. There are no
inspirational pics or anything. You can skip the presentation once you've read
his post.

But I think this list leaves out the important detail of
understanding/addressing root causes.

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kilian
Paraphrased: try something new. If it doesn't work, no biggie.

Sound advice.

