By Judi Light Hopson, Emma H Hopson and Ted Hagen/Tribune News Service


Are you tired of never getting what you want?
For instance, let’s say that you want to save for a down payment on a house.
You earn enough to put money aside, but you don’t.
Why? Because you keep buying $50 worth of lottery tickets every week.
Or, you keep vowing you’re going to lose weight. But old eating habits die hard.
Some of the human behaviour experts we consulted, had these tips for changing bad habits:
lTake pride in “failing fast”. In other words, get busy changing something, even if it turns out to be wrong.
An expert on how to quit smoking told us, “Many people make seven or eight attempts before they succeed in quitting. Each failed attempt is a lesson in what’s going to work for them or not work for them.”
lTrack down the success methods of other people. Do your homework and research.
For example, we recently learned that studies show we all tend to eat the same physical weight of food every day. The study said that by getting in the habit of eating low-calorie foods that are heavy in ounces - apples, carrots, rice - you will satisfy hunger faster.
Makes sense, doesn’t it?
l Stop doing what doesn’t work. For instance, have you ever tried to apply a failing method over and over because you believed that willpower was the missing ingredient?
While willpower is important, it can’t support you if a given method isn’t right for you.
For example, a man who attended one of our family workshops said he’d tried for years to improve his time management. “I was always in the habit of being late for work,” he told the group.
“What I finally figured out was that I really do need eight hours of sleep. I’ve always gone to bed at midnight and tried to get up by 6am.
“But six hours of sleep makes me so sluggish, it takes me until 7:30 to get out the door. I need to leave my house no later than 7:15.”
This man told us that he finally stopped trying willpower and implemented a sleep schedule that worked for him.
“I’m now in the habit of going to bed at 10:30. I’m up by 6:30 and gone by 7:15. I feel terrific and my mornings go great.”
The point is this: If you want to change a habit, use logic to analyse why you keep failing over and over. There is a reason you are not getting what you want, experts say.
Instead of beating yourself up, try to create a plan that you know will fly.
For instance, if you are wasting too much money on lottery tickets, try buying half as many. Sock the rest of the money away the rest in savings.
lIf nothing else gets you on the ball, use fear to motivate you.
Write yourself a letter on what will happen if you fail to change.
A financial expert we’ll call Donna says that she changed both her career and her spending habits out of sheer fright.
Says Donna: “I got motivated to stop squandering money and become financially fit when I saw a widow spend $3mn.”
Donna wasn’t kidding. She told us that she personally saw this well-to-do widow spend $3mn in eight years on travel, clothes, junk and bad jewellery.
In order to guide yourself to new habits, put every factor possible on your side.
Experts say these tips can help:
l Your habit must fit the rest of your daily routine. For example, if you can’t find time to exercise for 45 minutes, try breaking this down into three daily sessions of 15 minutes each.
If you can make a new habit fit smoothly into your lifestyle, your chances of success will be higher.
l Match your habit to the clock. For example, if you want to get in the habit of taking vitamins, plan to take them with either lunch or dinner.
lAccept the fact that your new habit change will get on your nerves. At least, it will in the beginning.
It will be like an unwelcome visitor knocking on your door, interrupting your old routine.
“The best way to stick with a habit, pain and all, is to keep looking at the long-term goal,” says Bill, a man in his 70s who runs marathons in our region.
“If the long-term goal excites you, you’ll develop the habits you need to get there. You’ll invent them out of sheer desire. But if you have good habits in place, you can get anything you want out of life.”
    

♦ Judi Light Hopson is the executive director of the stress management website USA Wellness Cafe at www.usawellnesscafe.com Emma Hopson is an author and a nurse educator. Ted Hagen is a family psychologist.