Habits: New Year, New Goals. Who hasn’t started their new year with good intentions only to find that just a few weeks later everything has gone back to normal? Why does this happen? Well often because the good intentions are not practical and don’t fit with our busy lives. The relaxed time over the holidays that allows us to dream, plan and to get started tends to quickly turn into the mad rush that is normal life and good intentions fly out the window. Want to break the cycle?

By the way – if you are wondering why I’m tackling the subject in February rather than in January it’s because in January most people are still optimistic about their ability to REALLY MAKE THE CHANGE this year. By February, many have come to the inevitable conclusion that in order to achieve their goals, a complete rethink is required. Good news – we have the answer for you and it’s not difficult. Our new approach focuses on STEP BY STEP building good habits which help us achieve our goals in a sustainable and effortless way.

Why habits? Well, habits are powerful because they become automatic, making it far easier to stick to your goals even when life gets busy. But how do you create good habits that don’t clash with your hectic lifestyle? It’s all in the details. By taking small, consistent actions everyday, you can build long term habits that will transform your life. Whether it’s waking up 10 minutes earlier to meditate or taking a 10 minute walk during your lunch break, these small habits lead to big changes. And the best part? Once these habits become a part of your routine, the bigger goals will take care of themselves. So, more time with your children keeping them off screens, more energy for starting that business, motivation to get rid of excess weight, or the time to change your job for one you really want…. All these are attainable but won’t happen during the first month of the year. In fact, it could take three months before you see significant change. But by the end of the year, you’ll be amazed at how much progress has been made and all that you have achieved.

Where’s this all come from? Feeling rather in a rut myself, I came across the book Atomic Habits by James Clear (available in the Book & Toy shop in Santa Ana and online for Costa Rica delivery) and found that it made so much sense. I realised too that habits underpin everything we try to do, so this year we have an annual theme which is HABITS. Specifically, incorporating helpful habits into your day-to-day life that will enable you to achieve your goals.

VERY IMPORTANT FACT. At the heart of developing good habits is the understanding that it’s not so much about willpower or motivation, but about creating a system that supports our goals. By deciding who we want to be, setting clear intentions that put us on the path to being that person, tracking our progress, and rewarding ourselves for small wins, we create a positive feedback loop that reinforces our new habits and makes them stick. As most of us are part of a family and cannot operate in isolation, the biggest challenge is often making sure that the rest of the family doesn’t wreck our good intentions. How can we tackle this? Do it together and create new FAMILY habits, where everyone can benefit. It’s a great legacy to pass to your children.

So how do we get started?

Forget about rules and decide what kind of person you want to be. For example: you are not looking to lose weight, but you are working on being a healthy person. By focusing on being that healthy person, the weight will reduce naturally. How does this translate into habits? You incorporate habits that emulate the choices that person would make, but starting with small, easily achievable steps. For example, you may decide that a healthy person would exercise upon getting up in the morning. However, forget trying to go for a half hour run. It’s NOT going to happen (not for more than a couple of days anyway). But if you decide to do a 10 minute walk with the dog as soon as you get up, then you ARE forming the habit. If you walk the dog five times a week, then you get consistency. This leads to a positive feedback loop with a high probability of either making the 10 minutes more intensive or extending the time to 20 minutes or more. You can also apply choices that you believe a healthy person would make. Would a healthy person choose an apple or a chocolate bar; grilled fish with vegetables or a burger and chips. Ask yourself every time you are faced with such choices. Making yourself aware of your choices is a crucial first step in making those choices better for your health.

So maybe things are sounding more doable, but what about the family and their ability to sabotage all your efforts? Let’s look at this idea of working with them to create healthy habits that not only benefit them, but make you a better parent, spouse etc. Bearing in mind that everybody has a different routine and what works for some families won’t work for others, consider the suggestions below as ideas to get you thinking about how to make changes in your day.

• Reducing screen time of your pre-teen children: Analyse when they are most likely to turn to screens and think about what can be substituted. One example could be as soon as they are back from school. Instead of them fleeing to their rooms and onto thier eletronics, take 15 minutes to sit down and discuss their day over a drink and a snack. Include their plan for the rest of the day (homework, sports, walk the dog etc) and have them state what they are going to do and when. This may include screen time, but you can inject a scheduled start and stop time rather than being never ending.
• Eliminate junk food snacks: Look at your environment. If you don’t have junk food available, then it can’t be eaten. This means 1.not even walking down the supermarket aisles that stock these types of foods, 2. avoiding supermarket or convenience store stopoffs on the way home from school and 3. making sure that you have ready to serve appetising and healthy options at home.
• Your child is forever forgetting key items for school: As part of their bedtime routine, include 5 minutes to look at their school schedule and verbally say each item they have to include in their backpack and verify that it is packed. You can start the routine together and once the habit is firmy entrenched allow your child to do it themselves. If there are things that need to be added in the morning, like their lunch, you can add a new habit just before leaving the house or as you all get in the car which is to check they have their backpack, lunch, sweater etc. Again for each item, have them verbally confirm they’ve seen it and have it with them.

On a family level and especially with children it is worth remembering that early habits form by imitating what they see around them. It’s also important to know that once set, habits are rarely forgotten – good or bad. So if you want them to be a reader, add story time into their bedtime routine. If you don’t want them to start bugging you for your phone or tablet every time they have a free minute, don’t use it in front of them.

Over the year we will be looking at different challenges that parents typically have and examine how new habits can help to put the whole family on track for a life that is healthy on all levels. Meanwhile, I very much recommend James Clear’s Atomic Habits book. If you truly want to make this year different, the trick – as with all major changes – is to start small, be consistent and truly plan for permanent change. Remember that when you look after the details, the big stuff works itself out.

Julie Godfrey is the founder and owner of The Book and Toy Company. A renowned bookworm, Julie has read a huge number of books and recently calculated that over the years researching books for Book & Toy, she has scrutinised more than 40,000 titles. (Living proof that small steps and consistent habits really do add up.) What only a few people know is that Julie is also a BANT (British Association for Nutrition and Lifestyle Medicine) registered Nutritional Therapist and used to be the Food & Nutrition columnist for the Tico Times.