Day Two: What We Know About Habit Formation

To get anything done, you need to have a habit of working on it. 

When I was a professor, my research included work on motivation, learning, and achievement. After I left teaching, I thought I was going to never think about that work again, but it has been surprisingly helpful in thinking about my writing. 

Knowing a thing or two about what makes people successful in a learning environment is actually helpful when you think about tackling a big project (aka writing a book). 

Today, on Day Two, I wanted to spend a little time thinking about habits--how they are formed, how long it takes to form them, and how they can help us accomplish tasks.

The best known popular book on habits is probably The Power of Habit by NYT business writer Charles Duhigg. He says that every  habit has the same three parts, that this three step process is neurological, and that the three parts in concert create automaticity. In other words, your brain follows a template which results in things that you used to have to think about becoming more or less effortless. 

The first step and subject of today's post is the cue.

The cue is an event that tells your brain it is time to engage in the habit. 

In her amazing book on creativity, The Creative Habit, world-famous choreographer Twyla Tharp says she uses a cue to get herself to the gym in the dark hours every morning. She calls this a starting ritual, and says it is an essential piece of any creative practice.

  Twyla Tharp at 77, photo credit Scott Parker-Anderson

Each morning, Tharp gets dressed, gets organized, leaves her apartment, hails a cab, and presto! Off to the gym she goes. She does a bunch of things every morning, but for Tharp, the cue is the cab. This small thing sets her up for a productive, creative day, and thus for a productive, creative life. 

For my vastly less exciting and glamorous afternoon treadmill routine, the starting ritual is changing into my workout clothes. (I can't do athleisure for exactly this reason. I need to associate stretchy pants with exercise, or else the magic fades.)  

A cue can trigger for both good and bad habits, which may help explain why I hit snooze every morning and why I always want chocolate after lunch. 

For Day Two of my fifteen minutes journey, I am thinking about--and searching for--a positive starting ritual to get me going on my fifteen minutes of writing. 

Both Duhigg and Tharp say you can create a cue or starting ritual for yourself, but they often emerge organically. At first, building the habit and the ritual may be effortful, but eventually it should become automatic, as in easy and stress free. 

Photo credit: Max Bender

Today, I'm thinking about things I do every morning. (Wake up, hit snooze, wake up again, make coffee, turn on the baby monitor, get dressed, apply sunscreen, etc.) 

One of these ordinary things could, and probably will become my starting ritual. 

What about you? Do you have a cue to inspire creativity?