The person that you want to become is dependent on your habits.

We all have a vision of our ideal self. That’s why we set goals with the hope that by accomplishing a specific objective we will get closer to creating this future version of ourselves. The way that we shape this future version and accomplish our goals is through our daily habits.

Daily habits are the behaviors that you repeat every day that either move you toward the life you want or keep you stuck in the same place.‍

‍So, you have to start acting like this new version of yourself to bring it into reality. You do this through your habits.

When I say that you have to become a different person, it doesn’t mean changing every aspect of yourself — it’s just a matter of leveling up by changing your everyday behaviors.

Most of these current behaviors are routine and you might not even notice them because they go past your conscious awareness. They are ingrained through repetition and either have a positive or negative impact.

It’s crucial to understand that actions shape who you are. They are the building blocks for your identity and dictate how you show up in this world. So, if you want to level up, you are going to have to develop new habits that will turn you into the 2.0 version of yourself. Which is what we are going to tackle today.

We are going to break down the role of habits and then develop your plan of attack.

Now before we dive too far into strategies, I want to go over why we have habits in the first place and how to use them to your advantage.

Why Do We Have Habits?

I like to view everything from an ancestral standpoint. It helps me make sense of it all and allows me to figure out how to apply it to my own life.‍

Energy Conservation‍

Everything on this planet operates through the lens of survival and adaptation.

Throughout all of human history, resources, including energy, were often scarce and we needed to conserve as much energy as possible for our survival.

Early humans faced almost unimaginable challenges, like finding food and shelter and avoiding predators like the 2000-pound cave bear.

Being able to develop efficient habits is what allowed our ancestors to conserve energy for tasks that were actually critical for survival: things like hunting, gathering, and building shelters, required a shit ton of energy.

Being able to automate less critical tasks in the form of habits allowed early humans to reserve mental energy for more physically demanding activities.‍

‍The human brain consumes around 20% of our metabolic energy. Which might not sound like a lot, but when you think about everything else the body has to do, 20% being devoted just to mental energy becomes a pretty large amount.

And being able to automate routine behaviors in the form of habits helps reduce the cognitive load that comes with decision-making. This allows our brains to conserve energy for things that actually impact our lives.

So, if it weren’t for habits, none of us would be here today because our ancestors wouldn’t have been able to devote vital energy to survival.‍

Tribal Living & Cultural Connection

Habits are also crucial for holding together the tribe. They help everyone work together for the success and survival of the community.

When people in a group have similar habits, it creates a sense of unity through common morals and values. And it’s through habits that our ancestors were able to pass down traditions and keep the cultural connection strong between generations.

Celebrations, rituals, and traditions are all rooted in habits.

So, efficient habits are not just personal behaviors; they are the foundation for a strong community.

When you take a step back, you’ll find these in your own family and inner circle. Everyone does certain tasks that results in success for the tribe.

The more positive the habits that the tribe shares, the stronger it is as a whole. Like I said earlier, habits are automatic behaviors that we perform on a daily basis, and we all have positive and negative ones.

When I say positive, I’m referring to any habit that is actually beneficial to your well-being and moves you in the direction that you want to go.

Luckily, you can kick any bad habit and replace it with a positive one. We can accomplish this by breaking down habit formation into a three-step process.‍

Three-Step Process to Habit Formation‍

This is known as the habit loop, which is: the trigger, the behavior, and the reward. All three of these together form a habit.‍

Step One: The Trigger‍

The trigger is the first step in the habit loop. It’s an external or internal signal that tells your brain to do a certain behavior.

These mental triggers can be fired in endless ways. A few examples are certain times of day, environment, emotional state, smell, taste, seeing something or even people.‍

Step Two: The Behavior

So, after the trigger we have the behavior, which is the actual action.

This is the part of the habit loop that people usually think is the habit itself, but a habit is actually a combination of all three aspects of the loop, which is important to understand.

The behavior itself can be a physical or mental action. Things like checking social media, working out, drinking coffee, meditating, smoking, pressing the snooze button, and even your self-talk are all behaviors that can be considered habits.

Now, obviously every action you take is not considered a habit. But when it is repeated on a daily basis, it gets pushed into that category.‍

Step Three: The Reward‍

After the trigger and behavior, we have the reward, which is why we continue doing these behaviors.

This is usually the feeling that follows the completion of the routine. It reinforces the habit loop by giving you a sense of pleasure which in all reality is just a release of dopamine.

Now, you might be thinking that you don’t get a reward out of every habit, but a lot of times they can be subtle and go past your conscious awareness.

There is some sort of reward attached to the behavior or else there wouldn’t be an urge to repeat it. And this is where we have to be careful, because most of the modern world is full of garbage that gives us a cheap hit of dopamine from things that are actually terrible for us.

For example, we get a massive release of it when we check social media, but this doesn’t mean that it’s beneficial for you. The same applies to eating poor-quality junk food.‍

So, the goal here is to reprogram yourself to get a hit of dopamine from habits that are actually serving you instead of working against you.

Dopamine itself is where we get motivation, and most people have very little drive because they are depleting themselves of this important neurotransmitter with things like: always being on their phone, eating poor-quality food, and overindulging in drugs and alcohol.

But you can train your mind to get this release of dopamine when you take action on things that help you accomplish your goals, which is just you doing things that are developing you into your ideal self.

And from my experience, the sense of fulfillment that you get from moving toward your goals is superior to anything else.

Now, I know that’s a lot to take in so let’s apply the habit loop for developing a practice of meditation.‍

Example: Using the Habit Loop ‍

Even if you have no urge to start meditating, this example will still help paint a vivid mental picture of the process so you can apply it to whatever habit you want.

FIRST: We need to do is develop a trigger. Let’s say you meditate right after waking up, and you do it in a specific location every time.

SECOND is the behavior itself, which is meditation. So, you set a timer for 5-10 minutes and try to focus on your breath.

The goal here isn’t to get efficient right out of the gate. It’s to develop the habit of taking action, which will lead to it getting easier over time and require less will-power.

The trick is to start off small, that way you increase the likelihood of you continuing to do it the next day.

THIRD: We have the final step which is the reward. Have something to look forward to after you finish meditating, like your morning coffee or, better yet, a cup of Fókus.

As you can see, we went through the whole habit loop which is the trigger, behavior, and reward.

Hopefully, that helps you understand how to apply the process to any new habit you want to build for yourself.

This leads us to the concept of habitual learning.‍

How to Develop Habitual Learning

Habitual learning is how our brains automatically learn and remember things through repeated actions.

When you do something over and over, like meditating every morning, your brain forms strong connections that make the actions automatic and efficient over time.

Like we discussed earlier, this is how our brains conserve mental energy and devote that mental energy to more crucial tasks.

The reason I wanted to go over this real quick is because building a new habit isn’t going to happen overnight. It’s going to take repetition and consistency to form these new connections in the brain.

So now that we have the meat and potatoes of habits, let’s apply all of this information to help you start stacking victories.‍

Set Ambitious Goals‍

The very best way to grow is by setting ambitious goals. And goals are nothing more than a destination, it’s the roadmap that will develop you into your ideal self. 

Without this destination, you are bound to wander aimlessly through life, but it's the daily habits that will get you from point A to point B. It’s the vehicle that will develop you into the person who can accomplish the goal.

One of the fundamental principles of building new habits is consistency through discipline.

When you consistently engage in behaviors that align with who you want to become, you reinforce the neural pathways associated with those actions. Over time, these pathways become stronger, making it easier for you to stick to the habit, and you will not have to overcome so much resistance to make it happen.‍

Be Consistent

The most vital thing to understand here is that consistency is the key to creating lasting change and achieving your long-term goals.

Now, staying consistent is the most difficult part of sticking to the new habits that will make your ambitions a reality, which is why creating small milestones can be extremely helpful.

You can do this by breaking down your larger goals into smaller, more manageable tasks that become habitual and lead to your overall success.

When you accomplish these small victories each day, it will give you the fuel to keep moving forward. This is what I refer to as stacking victories.

Each successful repetition of a new positive habit propels you upward, which reinforces the belief that you can succeed. You are building self-confidence in real-time through action.

You also need to be prepared to fight against negative habits that have been repeated over and over again throughout the years. And like any other enemy that we face in battle, we need to gain the upper hand if we plan to win. This is where self-awareness becomes absolutely crucial.

Cultivate Self-Awareness

Take time to check in with yourself throughout the day and make note of any actions that you are repeating; if the action is being repeated, then it’s most likely a habit.

From there you can identify the triggers that prompt the behavior and the rewards that reinforce it, that way you can start removing the negative triggers from your life.

Make sure that you are being honest with yourself about the impact any negative habit has on your life and future. It’s easy to say that it doesn’t have a big influence but when you zoom out and get a birds-eye view, you’ll see that it’s more detrimental than you originally thought.‍

‍That way you can conserve mental energy and dopamine to conquer life, just like our ancestors. All of this is going to take willpower but it’s worth it if you really want to level up. And willpower will be easier to harness with a strong WHY.‍

Figure Out Your WHY‍

Your WHY is what ignites your internal fire and keeps it blazing through tough times. Figure out WHY you want to make this change for yourself. Remember that in order for your WHY to be powerful, it cannot be surface-level.

You have to really dig deep and find your reason.

Saying things like, “I want to lose weight to look better” is not going to cut it. Ask yourself WHY you want to look better. Then continue asking yourself WHY until you get the root of it all.

This simple strategy can be absolutely life-changing and will have you running through walls to achieve victory.

Now, it's up to you to take all this knowledge and put it into action.

Habits are the foundation of your transformation, and each small step forward is a small win that compounds over time.

Remember, it’s not about perfection, but progress. The road to becoming your ideal self is built on consistency, discipline, and a strong WHY.

So, embrace the challenge, stay committed, and keep stacking victories. In time, you’ll look back and realize that you’ve become exactly who you set out to be, one habit at a time.