Kamjah .. The Chronicles

2 Part Series

Part 1 - “Learning a New Behavior - Forming a New Habit”

Part 2 - “Replacing and Old Habit With a New One”

Learning a New Behavior
Forming a New Habit

Can you imagine letting go of the habits that are not serving you and replacing them with ones that are. I bet you notice how good it feels to imagine that. You may even find that you like the idea so much that you keep reading to see what comes next!

Lets start with defining what a habit is..

A habit is an automatic response / reaction to a specific stimulus. Once you experience the stimulus you do the habit without thinking. We form habits for two primary reasons: 1. to bring us closer to what pleasures us and 2. to move us away from what we perceive as causing us pain. Another way to put is is that every habit has a positive intention, whether we are conscious of it or not.

First lets go over the stages in learning:

1. Unconscious Incompetence - This is where you are unaware that you don’t know

2. Conscious Incompetence - This is when you are aware that you don’t know

3. Conscious Competence - You know what you need to know but you still have to consciously think about it

4. Unconscious Competence - You know what you know so well that you don’t even have to think about it

Here are some examples of activities that many people in their life have achieved the level of unconscious competence in: driving a car, making toast, taking a shower, brushing their teeth, riding a bike, etc…

See if you can think of some things that you might benefit from having a level of “Unconscious Competence” in..

Say for example you want to become a more social person and perhaps you suffer from social anxiety. If you recognize that it will benefit you to become a more socially aware human then you are starting at the level of “Conscious Incompetence” and through practice and coaching you can rapidly reach the level of “Unconscious Competence”. That’s the level where you automatically know the right thing to say and do in almost all situations.. Kinda like you don’t even have to think about the right words instead they just come.

The steps involved in forming a new habit:

1. Map the Behavior - The first step for learning a new behavior is to have a mental map of it, to understand what you are learning and why. Take 20 minutes to imagine yourself stepping into the new behavior and living it. Notice all the details and how good it will feel and the benifit you reap because of it. It’s always good to be clear in the purpose and how it is going to serve you. Take 45 minutes to write this down in detail. If for nothing else, clarities sake.

2. Practice - Once you have a mental understanding of the behavior, you need to practice the action over and over again in order for it to become a habit.

3. Positive Feelings Catch Up - Initially, as you practice the new behavior you will probably feel uncomfortable, awkward, and worst of all…phony. As you continue to practice, you feel more and more comfortable. Feelings lag behind thinking. The you practice over and over again is so the you can become more and more comfortable during the behavior.

4. Behavior Becomes Automatic - With consistent practice, emotional comfort increases. Eventually the new action becomes automatic; thus it becomes habit.

What new habits do you want to acquire?

For many people it’s the habit of knowing what to say in social situations, for others it’s the habit of waking up early, and for some it’s gaining the habit of going to the gym daily. Right now, choose the new habit you want to create and get to work. Do you want to reach your habit goal faster? If so then sooner or later you may want to contact a life coach like me. I wrote this article so naturally as you can imagine and see I know a thing or two about this subject. Either way good luck and stay tuned for Part 2: Replacing an Old Habit With a New One.

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~ Geoff

(305) 851-2459
www.kamjah.com

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Tags: Developing New Habits, Forming New Habits, Life Coaching, New Behaviors, New Habits, NLP, Old Habits

This entry was posted on Monday, August 24th, 2009 at 11:28 pm and is filed under Applies to All, Life Coaching, NLP. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.