For some, the arrival of September beckons back-to-school preparations — a grand and sometimes cruel wind of the alarm clock backward to support a morning routine of new healthy habits. Or maybe it signals that it’s time to hunker down at the home office or corporate HQ and focus, focus, focus. For others, it’s weekends fixated on football — at the tailgate lot or in front of the TV.
No doubt about it, when the Autumnal Equinox slices the day and night into two equal halves on Sept. 22, there is much more transitioning than the seasons.
And no matter how your life and daily routine shift, this time of year can and should be about getting Back to Structure, for everyone: replacing bad habits, regrouping, and re-energizing before the harried holiday season.
Let’s embrace our fresh start, and let’s start figuring out how to make this a September to remember — and beyond — by weaving more healthy habits and achievable goals into your life.
How to Break Bad Habits
Summer may be about surface conversations in the shallow end of the pool. But the transitions of the natural world and our ebb and flow of our own personal and professional life, are a terrific prompt to ask some deep questions. To take stock of what’s really working and what’s not. And to dial in our routines.
- What am I doing well?
- What can I do better?
- Where do I want to be in 3, 6, 12 months?
Try this: pick a bad habit, any bad habit or ill-advised routine that you haven’t kicked in spite of science, societal norms, or even setbacks you’ve experienced due to this repeated behavior. For our purposes, we’ll pick a topic we can all relate to: sleep. Specifically, poor sleep. Some relate much better than others, with an estimated one in three adults in the United States not getting enough sleep and up to 70 million dealing with a sleep disorder. [1]
A Wake-Up Call for Healthy Habits
Everyone knows this bedtime story: sleep is important, but it’s hard to find time to sleep, harder to fall asleep, and hardest to function optimally after only getting a couple hours of Zzzz’s yet again. Yawn, right? But sleep is an appropriate topic right now for so many reasons. For starters, sleep can be the cornerstone by which you build healthy habits and rebuild structure in your life. A new schedule means a new sleep schedule, and why can’t it be a healthier one?
And boy can it be healthy. From lowering blood pressure to reducing the risk of diabetes and enhancing mental health, waking up feeling refreshed does a lot more than simply get you through the day. Consistently getting 7 to 8 hours of sleep can also come with some unexpected benefits — the fruits of the very steps that got you there: less screen time and more reading, putting the cork back in the wine bottle earlier, weaning off daytime caffeine, and even having a clean and organized sleep space. These are just a few of the common tips for improving sleep hygiene that come with their own built-in benefits. [2]
But poor sleep is just one example of a bad habit that becomes ingrained in our routine. Smoking, drinking alcohol or eating in excess, gambling away the nest egg, being overly sedentary, and even embracing an anti-social lifestyle are all behaviors that can be flipped into healthy habits. But it takes time and work.
Transforming Bad Habits Into Healthy Habits
In the same way that the bad habits we identify as part of our daily routines grew through repetition in the hustle and bustle of daily life — and are often rewarded and reinforced with a drip of the “feel good” hormone dopamine — we need to dig deep to reverse them. [3]
One positive first step is identifying triggers for these habits throughout the day. When it comes to lackluster sleep, for example, do you start binging your favorite streaming shows after dark, always getting drawn in later and longer than you planned? Try catching up in the mornings or weekends instead. Another healthy habit, smarter meal choices, could be as easy as altering your daily drive home so that you don’t pass the greasy spoon with the amazing bacon cheese fries — maybe even rerouting toward that local farmer’s market.
Here’s another technique for jettisoning hardwired routines: practice avoiding that bad habit in your head ahead of time. With this Yoda-approved approach, you’re visualizing yourself in a scenario that often leads to indulging in a bad habit. So, that happy hour where you plan on having one drink and safely heading home? Think through every detail: when you’ll arrive, who you’ll make small talk with, and what you’ll say when you’re pressured to keep the party going.
Ultimately, the experts say we can’t just drop a bad habit; we need to replace it. And that’s good news, right? Now, you have a primetime slot for adding something new to your life. Been curious about pickleball? Grab a racket. Interested in starting a backyard vegetable garden? Boom! You just found time to get growing. And if it is sleep that you’ve been denying, well, catch a full 8 hours and see how much more productive your days get.
Greenlight for Goal Setting Good Habits
Once you’ve audited, pruned, and parted ways with habits that only take from us, you’re ready for the next phase of our Back to Structure crash course: setting goals (and establishing the structure to actually achieve them).
A goal can absolutely be to kick that bad habit to the curb. It’s a great starting point. But think bigger and more audaciously, too.
At Truvaga, we’re all in on meditation and transcendental approaches to problem-solving. But for this exercise, we want you to find a pen and paper. Not a tablet, stylus, laptop, or smartphone, but some loose leaf and real ink. We’re going to do this old school. Cursive optional.
Now … write down your goals! No goal is stupid. Simply write them all down, then start grouping them with similar ones, and then rank them. [4]
There’s a reason we’re doing this, and it’s not just to see if you can actually still handwrite anything other than your signature and today’s date. Hardened science has shown that the practice of writing goals down has a direct correlation to our success in achieving them. Bonus points for framing them with affirmative, actionable language such as, “I will…” or “Let’s do this!”
Now, choose one of these goals. Maybe one that’s built on a foundation of a couple of healthy habits. For example, if you’re going to run a 10K, you need to tackle healthy eating, solid sleep hygiene, and even joining a training team with a built-in social element. Oh, and there’s all that exercise, too. Pick a goal that’s motivating, exciting, and ultimately inspiring but also one that’s attainable.[5]
The best goals are the ones you can divide into smaller, more achievable ones. So, week one of your 10K training may simply consist of getting out to walk each day, building a better hydration regimen, and starting some healthy meal planning. Small victories add up fast. And before you know it, you’ll be thinking about stepping up to a marathon.
Stick the Landing with Structure
We’ve talked about Fall, and September in particular, as being an ideal time to restore structure to your life while beginning the dogged pursuit of healthy habits. We also broke down some strategies for identifying and eliminating bad habits while focusing on truly inspiring goals that can change the trajectory of your overall well-being.
We know, it’s a lot. But there’s one more thing, too: structure. Now, don’t mistake structure for rigidity; you need to have some flexibility in your daily routine to ensure resilience in the face of unpredicted obstacles. Structure is a schedule, but it’s more than that. It’s consistency. It’s a mindset. It’s a commitment to a core set of healthy habits that are right for you. It’s also the ability to reshuffle a deck of dates and times on the fly if needed — and stabilize afterward.
That said, here are a few tips for developing the needed structure to eradicate insidious habits and clear the path for banging the gong of goal achievement: [6]
Maximize mornings:
Make your bed. Meditate. Hydrate. Complete your daily gratitude journal. Eat protein. Exercise. In other words, kickstart your day with purpose and positivity! That may be a lot to start, so pick two or three to build momentum out of the gates.
Likewise, focus evening activities on winding down and planning for tomorrow. Creating a checklist to take the uncertainty out of tomorrow, or at least have potential challenges clearly on your radar, is a proven technique for managing stress and sleeping soundly. [7]
Leverage tech:
We’re not just talking about syncing digital calendars and even using habit tracker apps (Yes, they exist; try Streaks or Way of Life). We’re also talking about tech that promotes physical and mental well-being. It’s because that’s our world; specifically, creating innovative handheld devices that reduce stress, improve sleep, restore calm, and boost clarity — all by targeting the all-powerful vagus nerve. (We’d love the chance to tell you more about vagus nerve science and how we’re helping people make sure their vagus nerve is working for and not against them.)[8]
Start small, take breaks, and reward yourself.
In other words, be realistic. Rome wasn’t built in a day; heck, it took those contractors 13 months to install a bathroom in your master bedroom. So don’t get overzealous from the get-go. Instead, try this: the Pomodoro [9] technique. Blaze through work or any to-do for 25 minutes, then reward yourself with a well-earned 5-minute break. Repeat four times, and extend that break to 20 or 30 minutes. Check out that new movie trailer you’ve been hyped up for, play with the dog, or sneak in a chapter of your guilty pleasure romance novel, “Brush With Fate at Widow’s Peak.”
Some days will be better than others, and some days will be different than others (but maybe this Wednesday looks pretty similar to next Wednesday). Oh, and remember: those aforementioned breaks and rewards aren’t the kind that deliver a quick shot of dopamine and a return to your old ways.
It’s OK to restart:
No two people have the same routine. And even finding your own unique groove takes some time. Give yourself grace and hit the reset button if you try your new routine on for size and it’s a little tight in all the wrong places.
Your Homework: Fall Forward Pursuing Healthy Habits & Inspiring Goals
We’ve given you many assignments. And that’s OK. Because you have the knowledge to break it down, prioritize, and tailor it to your needs. And sure, you’ll make mistakes. You may need to redo or reset as you learn along the way.
Getting Back to Structure isn’t just about replacing some bad habits with healthy habits while running after a goal or two. It’s about stretching to find your sweet spot — that place where you can look back next September and see that you’re feeling good, you’re in control, and that you’re capable of even more.
At Truvaga, we’re rooting you on. And we’re here to help, whether it’s helping you find new ways to shed stress and find calm, or being a gatekeeper of best practices to help you optimize your well-being.
Sources:
[1] NIH: National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, What Are Sleep Deprivation and Deficiency?, https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/sleep-deprivation
[2] WebMD, How Your Bad Habits Affect Your Health, https://www.webmd.com/balance/ss/slideshow-bad-habits
[3] NIH: News in Health, Breaking Bad Habits, Why It’s So Hard to Change,
https://newsinhealth.nih.gov/2012/01/breaking-bad-habits
[4] and [5] NSLS,Goal-Setting Techniques and Strategies You Can Use Now for Future Success, https://www.nsls.org/goal-setting-techniques#
[6] Mental Health America, Creating Healthy Routines, https://mhanational.org/creating-healthy-routines
[7] Calm, How to build a daily routine: 10 habits for a productive day,
https://www.calm.com/blog/daily-routine
[8] Truvaga, Vagus Nerve Science, https://www.truvaga.com/vagus-nerve-science/
[9] Calm, How to build a daily routine: 10 habits for a productive day,
https://www.calm.com/blog/daily-routine
