21 days to form a new habit

[A_Lurker]

I was posting something else this morning and found a great link.  For those of us, and I am definitely in this group, who have tried and failed to lose weight over the years... here's a link about the '21 days to form a new habit', which it turns out is yet another urban myth.

http://jamesclear.com/new-habit

On average, it takes more than 2 months before a new behavior becomes automatic — 66 days to be exact. And how long it takes a new habit to form can vary widely depending on the behavior, the person, and the circumstances. In Lally’s study, it took anywhere from 18 days to 254 days for people to form a new habit.

In other words, if you want to set your expectations appropriately, the truth is that it will probably take you anywhere from two months to eight months to build a new behavior into your life — not 21 days.

Interestingly, the researchers also found that “missing one opportunity to perform the behavior did not materially affect the habit formation process.” In other words, it doesn’t matter if you mess up every now and then. Building better habits is not an all-or-nothing process.

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So the take away I get from this is that I'm not a freak for not instantly finding my new eating and activity level normal.  Also, it shouldn't be an all-or-nothing process.  To be fair I've figured this out by now, but it's nice to have a health psychology researcher saying the same thing. 

[Odyssey13]

Thanks for sharing this @A_Lurker

It makes perfect sense. Why do we always think twenty-one days is the magic number when we're all individuals? What works for you might not work for me.

Now I know why I keep saying patience is rewarded. Just have to remember patience can take more than those mythical twenty-one days!

[WendyB]

Thanks for the link! It does make perfect sence to me as well.

[bcalvanese]

Anything that says 'you can do x in x number of days" is BS.

I don't know about the rest of you but it took me years and decades to become obese, and it took me a year and a half so far to lose about 55 lbs. I still have about 10 to 15 lbs. to go, but i didn't do it following any BS plan.

I did it through knowledge of fitness and diet that I learned back in the 80's when i was in the Army. I took that knowledge and slowly & gradually replaced my bad habits with good ones. I focused on total health, and not just diet or exercise. Both, with emphasis on fitness level.

[A_Lurker]

@Timsteryo - there's a pretty great group of people hanging around here.  Welcome 

[emili]

welcome @Timsteryo and hope to see you around!

A behavior change is accomplished through repetition and reinforcement (eat healthy- lose weight, move more- become more fit) regardless of what the task actually is. The length of time it takes for an individual to not only notice their behavior change, but change enough that it "sticks" is so different for each person, assigning any number of days to it is ridiculous. Behavioral science is one of the most mysterious ones out there for this very reason. We are all programmed different. How ingrained are the previous habits? What and how many emotional triggers exist? Are there dependencies and addictions to overcome first? All of that is factored into breaking bad habits to form good ones. Yes of course if you do something for 21 days exactly as prescribed, you will accomplish X in those 21 days. Its day 22 I would question... @A_Lurker thanks for posting, I hope more folks read the link...