I’m working on my 4th book, and I think it will be revolutionary to a same or greater degree than Mini Habits was.
As with most things I write, I mix science, intuition, and heavy analysis with my personal experience. It’s worked well to this point because of my lazy disposition. If something gets me moving and makes sense scientifically, there’s a good chance it’ll work for a lot of people.
With this new book, I’m taking things a bit further.
A Method to the Madness
I am fascinated at how some actors prepare for their roles. They’ll transform themselves to a surprising (and sometimes even dangerous) degree. Christian Bale lost 62 pounds for his role in The Machinist. Just take a look at this picture…
That’s serious dedication to do that for one movie.
I’m not doing anything that extreme, but I am doing a bit of “method acting” in preparation for my next book.
I’m purposefully not exercising.
I still play basketball every Tuesday since I host that weekly. But otherwise, I’ve been holding off and going into a bit of a lazy slump. Why?
I want to lean into my lazy side before I emerge as a phoenix from the ashes with the new book’s concept!
It’s become more difficult to test new ideas as I’ve already successfully changed some of my habits. How can you know if something can take you from 0 to 60 when you’re starting at 45?
I’ve been at “zero” before, and that was key in helping me to create truly effective strategies, but in order to really test this new idea and gain important insights, I need to regress. I need to go back to zero now. Maybe I don’t need to, but I want to because of how excited I am about this idea. I’m confident that it’s going to work.
I want to have zero momentum. I want to be in a rut and see if and/or how this pulls me out of it.
While it’s still early in my slump experiment, it’s already working (ugh). It feels terrible! You’ll hear more about the book and its core idea later, but for now I want to say a few very interesting things about what I’ve learned by going into a slump.
The Two Speeds of Change
To change from a couch potato to exercising phenom, it takes a good amount of time for your physiology and brain to adapt to your new lifestyle. Behavior change is slow, but long-lasting.
To change from inactive to active can be done this instant, and to go from active to inactive can happen quickly as well.
Since purposefully slumping, I’ve been amazed at how quickly my body has embraced lazy mode. I mean, was all that habit work I did over the last few years useless? I have less energy than usual. I have less motivation to exercise. I felt these changes very quickly! Feelings change fast, but the effect is temporary.
Consistency Is Everything, But Nothing Is Permanent
We all have neural pathways for dormant activities like sitting. We also have neural pathways for activities like walking, running, and lifting weights. Each of us activates and deactivates these pathways at different rates and strengths. I have a friend who walks something like 10 miles a day and rarely misses. Her various “take a walk” neural pathways are very strong. It’s not only easy for her to walk a lot, it’s her preferred behavior on a subconscious level.
From my experiences in the last several years, I’ve seen how consistency creates momentum and crushes resistance to action. That’s how I went from one push-up a day to a consistent exerciser.
But this experimental slump has taught me something else valuable—nothing is permanent. Even after you form a strong habit, if you neglect it and begin living differently, you will feel differently fast. Especially for someone lazy like me, my brain remembers what it’s like to be inactive, and it still loves it.
Important: The abrupt change in feelings from a few “off” days isn’t as dire as it feels, unless you believe it is.
I think it’s important to understand how this works because after even just a couple of days doing the wrong things, you may feel completely out of sync. You may feel like your previous progress was in vain. But that feeling will change the instant you get back on track.
Right now, my brain wants to keep me in this lazy state, despite the many negative ramifications of doing so, and despite all of my positive experiences being active.
What This Means for Us
Habits are strong in the sense that they can easily be maintained. If you don’t have an exercise habit, it’s tough to keep dragging yourself to the gym. If you do, it’s relatively easy to go to the gym all the time.
Habits are weak in the sense that if you stop doing them, they may go dormant or semi-dormant until awakened again. This is especially the case with good habits that require effort, as their reward loop is longer and more complex than that of bad habits. This means the brain unfortunately always leans towards bad habits. We’re wired for those instantaneous rewards. Food is a great example, and within the concept of food, simple carbs deliver the strongest and fastest reward. That’s why people like dessert!
Good habits are life-changing and worth pursuing. Once established, good habits are easy to activate and can feel invincible, but in truth, they are somewhat easy to temporarily deactivate (until activated again). We lived differently before creating these good habits, and those prior neural pathways don’t just disappear (they weaken without use).
The good news? When it comes to passive, lazy habits, the same is true. If you feel like your current down state is permanent, remember that it’s easy to deactivate it with a counter action. This has been my big realization—feeling lazy is powerfully demotivating, and will continue to loop unless intervened with, but it’s never as formidable or permanent as it feels.
So here I am, sitting down. I feel super lazy (even though I’m working, I’m sedentary). I’m not going to consider exercising consistently again until I get a few details sorted with this new strategy I’m trying. Needless to say, I look forward to breaking out of this slump!
In conclusion, I remember just how frustrating it can be when you’ve been inactive in an area that matters to you. You can feel so far away from where you want to be, but the way out is always closer than it feels, and I find that very valuable to keep in mind.
Behavior change takes a lot of time to solidify, but to change your feelings right now with action takes mere seconds. Take that first step and you’ll feel something else—positive forward momentum.
Alright, it’s back to slumping for me! Oh, the things we do for (behavioral) science.
