Habit stacking means adding new habits onto existing ones - to the things you already automatically do every day.
After waking up in the morning, you might put on a cup of coffee. When you visit the bathroom, you wash your hands. And before you go to bed, you brush your teeth. Throughout the day, we have lots of such behaviours that we perform automatically, and we can take advantage of them to establish new habits.

Habit stacking

<ul>
<li>Identify a habit that you do every day. Make a list of all your current habits, to identify which would be suitable to stack new habits onto. It could be anything, as long as you perform it consistently. This habit will serve as your cue to start your new habit. </li>
<li>Add the new habit right afterwards.</li>
<li>When you’re creating a new habit, make things as easy as possible. It’s recommended to make new habits so easy that you’re able to do them, no matter how tired or unmotivated you are.</li>
</ul>

Adding a new habit to your life

<figure><img alt="Image for post" src="https://miro.medium.com/max/500/1*snbuCNPKhLaXKqOEBz3G4g.jpeg" width="680" height="340"><figcaption class="ec ed cs cq cr ee ef bp b eg br bs" data-selectable-paragraph="" dir="ltr">Image by <a href="https://pixabay.com/users/geralt-9301/?utm_source=link-attribution&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=image&amp;utm_content=1829501" class="bv eh" rel="noopener nofollow" dir="ltr">Gerd Altmann</a> from <a href="https://pixabay.com/?utm_source=link-attribution&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=image&amp;utm_content=1829501" class="bv eh" rel="noopener nofollow" dir="ltr">Pixabay</a></figcaption></figure>Creating a new habit can be quite challenging. It’s a lot easier to keep doing what you’ve been doing than to make a change to your life.Creating a consistent routine is even harder. A routine contains all the actions you take during a specific period of the day, for example, a morning routine.Therefore, it makes sense to make it as easy as possible when you’re trying to implement new habits into your routine. An effective way to do this is called habit stacking. Habit stacking is a method where you add new habits onto existing ones — things you already automatically do every day.When you wake up in the morning, you might put on a cup of coffee. When you visit the bathroom, you wash your hands. And before you go to bed, you brush your teeth. Throughout the day, we have lots of such behaviours that we perform automatically, and we can take advantage of them to establish new habits.<h1 data-selectable-paragraph="">Habit stacking</h1>When adding a new habit to your life, such as exercising, playing an instrument or learning a language, habit stacking is one of the easiest ways to do it.First, you need to identify a habit that you do every day. It could be anything, as long as you perform it consistently. This habit will serve as your cue to start your new habit. The second step is to add the new habit right afterwards.It can, for example, be: I drink my first coffee in the morning — then I start writing an article on Medium. I brush my teeth — then I do five pushups. I take a shower — then I meditate for two minutes. I turn off my computer — then I practice a song at my piano.Your goal is to link your new desired habit with an existing one, and after you’ve done your current habit, you will do your new habit. Your old habit will become the trigger for the new one.<h1 data-selectable-paragraph="">Make it easy at first</h1>When you’re creating a new habit, you want to make things as easy as possible. The end goal may be to do fifty pushups or study a skill for an hour per day, but in the beginning, you want to make it easy, in order to establish the habit. As you’ve gotten used to doing it every day, you can gradually increase the amount of the new habit.If you can’t even bring yourself to do a few pushups or write for five minutes, you can’t expect to start performing intense one-hour sessions every day. By gradually implementing the new habit, you improve the likelihood that you succeed. It’s totally fine to do more than five pushups or practice for longer than five minutes. But it’s never ok to not do it. When you start skipping to take action, it’s a warning sign that the new habit is about to fade away and disappear.It’s therefore useful to make new habits so tiny that you’re able to do them, no matter how tired or unmotivated you are, and as you keep doing them, you plant the seeds to creating consistent habits.<h1 data-selectable-paragraph="">Make a list and identify the best pairings</h1>By making a list of all your current habits, you can identify which would be suitable to stack new habits onto. It may not be ideal to pair your pushup routine with the habit of entering the bus every morning. Or practising your drumming skills after brushing your teeth at night. Pair up skills that fit with your current location and time of the day.When you pick a habit to add on to, say to yourself: after finishing (old habit), I will do (new habit). After you have successfully paired an old habit with a new one, you can keep adding to the sequence, effectively creating a whole routine.It can be something like this. After I take a shower in the morning, I will meditate. After I meditate, I will plan out my day. After I plan out my day, I will do five pushups. After I do five pushups, I will make a cup of coffee. After I make a cup of coffee, I will write on Medium for 15 minutes.To make habit stacking work, it’s crucial to start stacking on a habit that you do without fail, every day — as each habit in the routine depends upon the one coming before it. If you break the chain or don’t even start it, your routine may fail. Also, remember to start with low expectations, beginning with new habits that are easy to perform. As you start getting used to performing them every day, you can increase the number of habits and the length of each habit.<h1 data-selectable-paragraph="">Take home message</h1><UL><LI>It’s challenging to create new habits, at it feels more comfortable to do things the way we’re used to.</LI><LI>Habit stacking takes advantage of your already existing habits, to establish new ones.</LI><LI>It works by pairing up existing habits, something you do every day, and then right away performing a new habit.</LI><LI>Try to make the new habit very easy to perform in the beginning, to limit your resistance to take action, and then extend practice time as the habit has been established.</LI></UL>Thanks for reading, sharing and following! :)If you liked this article, you may also enjoy:

Creating a new habit can be quite challenging. It’s a lot easier to keep doing what you’ve been doing than to make a change to your life. Creating a consistent routine is even harder. A routine…

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

habits

Habits

problemsolving

Problem Solving

timemanagement

Time Management

Creating a new habit can be quite challenging. It’s a lot easier to keep doing what you’ve been doing than to make a change to your life.

Creating a consistent routine is even harder. A routine contains all the actions you take during a specific period of the day, for example, a morning routine.

Therefore, it makes sense to make it as easy as possible when you’re trying to implement new habits into your routine. An effective way to do this is called habit stacking . Habit stacking is a method where you add new habits onto existing ones — things you already automatically do every day.

When you wake up in the morning, you might put on a cup of coffee. When you visit the bathroom, you wash your hands. And before you go to bed, you brush your teeth. Throughout the day, we have lots of such behaviours that we perform automatically, and we can take advantage of them to establish new habits.

When adding a new habit to your life, such as exercising, playing an instrument or learning a language, habit stacking is one of the easiest ways to do it.

First, you need to identify a habit that you do every day. It could be anything, as long as you perform it consistently. This habit will serve as your cue to start your new habit. The second step is to add the new habit right afterwards.

It can, for example, be: I drink my first coffee in the morning — then I start writing an article on Medium. I brush my teeth — then I do five pushups. I take a shower — then I meditate for two minutes. I turn off my computer — then I practice a song at my piano.

Your goal is to link your new desired habit with an existing one, and after you’ve done your current habit, you will do your new habit. Your old habit will become the trigger for the new one.

When you’re creating a new habit, you want to make things as easy as possible. The end goal may be to do fifty pushups or study a skill for an hour per day, but in the beginning, you want to make it easy, in order to establish the habit. As you’ve gotten used to doing it every day, you can gradually increase the amount of the new habit.

If you can’t even bring yourself to do a few pushups or write for five minutes, you can’t expect to start performing intense one-hour sessions every day. By gradually implementing the new habit, you improve the likelihood that you succeed. It’s totally fine to do more than five pushups or practice for longer than five minutes. But it’s never ok to not do it. When you start skipping to take action, it’s a warning sign that the new habit is about to fade away and disappear.

It’s therefore useful to make new habits so tiny that you’re able to do them, no matter how tired or unmotivated you are, and as you keep doing them, you plant the seeds to creating consistent habits.

Make a list and identify the best pairings

By making a list of all your current habits, you can identify which would be suitable to stack new habits onto. It may not be ideal to pair your pushup routine with the habit of entering the bus every morning. Or practising your drumming skills after brushing your teeth at night. Pair up skills that fit with your current location and time of the day.

When you pick a habit to add on to, say to yourself: after finishing (old habit), I will do (new habit). After you have successfully paired an old habit with a new one, you can keep adding to the sequence, effectively creating a whole routine.

It can be something like this. After I take a shower in the morning, I will meditate. After I meditate, I will plan out my day. After I plan out my day, I will do five pushups. After I do five pushups, I will make a cup of coffee. After I make a cup of coffee, I will write on Medium for 15 minutes.

To make habit stacking work, it’s crucial to start stacking on a habit that you do without fail, every day — as each habit in the routine depends upon the one coming before it. If you break the chain or don’t even start it, your routine may fail. Also, remember to start with low expectations, beginning with new habits that are easy to perform. As you start getting used to performing them every day, you can increase the number of habits and the length of each habit.

<ul><li>It’s challenging to create new habits, at it feels more comfortable to do things the way we’re used to. </li><li>Habit stacking takes advantage of your already existing habits, to establish new ones. </li><li>It works by pairing up existing habits, something you do every day, and then right away performing a new habit. </li><li>Try to make the new habit very easy to perform in the beginning, to limit your resistance to take action, and then extend practice time as the habit has been established. </li> </ul>

Thanks for reading, sharing and following! :)

If you liked this article, you may also enjoy:

Habit Stacking — How to Create Your Perfect Routine

Habit stacking

Adding a new habit to your life

Kyle Red's ideas are part of this journey:

Related collections

Similar ideas