None of these stories are mine. They were sent to me by readers of Atomic Habits. I hope that these examples will illustrate how real people are putting the book into practice. They will show you what people are doing to build good habits and break bad ones. And hopefully, they will spark some ideas for how you can do the same.
I have divided the stories into categories that roughly correspond to different sections or ideas in the book.
Identity-based habits
One of the central ideas in the book is the concept of building “identity-based habits,” which essentially recommends focusing on the type of person you wish to become rather than the outcome you want to achieve.
One reader named Roland used the idea to improve his eating habits.
“I stopped eating unhealthy food via identity change,” he wrote. “I tried many times in the past, but it became easy — natural — only after I had made the conscious decision that I want to be someone who eats healthy. Instead of aiming to stop eating bad food, I tried changing the mindset to I am someone who eats healthy and lives a healthy life. It changes how you approach things.”
Another reader named Robert employed this idea to help him quit smoking. He wrote, “I recently stopped smoking, and the difference between I don't smoke, and I can't smoke a powerful trainer of my brain. The positive message of I don't smoke is that I have not “given up” anything. I am not sacrificing pleasure. I am investing in my future happiness and wellbeing.”
Chapter 2 of Atomic Habits covers these strategies in much greater detail.
Changing the Cues
Another way you can change a habit is by identifying and altering the cues that prompt your behavior. This is precisely what many readers have done.
One woman named Lisa cultivated a reading habit by increasing her exposure to books. “I've read more books by continually having 20-30 books on hold at the library,” she said. “It saves time on browsing for books. I always have new things to read with a three-week deadline.”
Heather used a similar strategy to reinforce the simple habit of drinking more water. “I use color and placement for visual reminding and motivation. I poured water in a bright aqua water bottle – my favorite color – and placed it on my nightstand so I couldn’t miss it when I woke up.”
Habit Stacking
Another popular tactic in the book is something I call “habit stacking.” It's a strategy I first learned from Stanford professor B.J. Fogg. He refers to it as “anchoring” because you anchor—or stack—your new habit onto a current practice.
One reader used habit stacking to create a simple rule for learning a new language.
“When I first moved to China and started to learn Mandarin, I committed to striking up a conversation with the taxi driver whenever I went into a cab (I took a lot of cab rides, 5+ daily). I did it for two years, no matter the time of day or how tired I was. I now speak fluent Chinese.”
Similarly, a reader named David told me, “I meditate for 20 minutes after brushing my teeth in the morning. Linking new habits onto a keystone one seems to work.”
You'll find all sorts of habit stacking examples in Chapter 5 of Atomic Habits.
Environment Design, Part I
I have written about the power of the environment and the importance of choice architecture in the past. The simple truth is our environment often shapes our behavior. Many readers are using this to their benefit by installing some of the environment design strategies I share in the book.
For starters, you can break a bad habit by increasing the friction in your environment.
One woman named Cyd curtailed her snacking habit with the following strategy. “My husband still loves his Pringles, as do I, but they’re now kept in a locked car that’s parked in the cold. It works!”
Multiple readers are learning to wake up earlier.
One reader named Daniel told me, “I jump out of bed every morning without any hesitation. The reason? The only way to turn off my alarm is to scan a QR Code I keep in the bathroom. This worked wonders for me.”
Chris utilized both environment design and habit stacking to stop sleeping in. He wrote, “I have a bad habit: Hitting snooze. To eliminate it, I “made it hard” and put the phone in the bathroom. The phone then became a habit stack. The first thing I do when I wake up: turn off the alarm, go to the bathroom, brush teeth, etc.”
It's a great example of creating just enough friction to keep your bad habits at bay.
Environment Design, Part II
Typically, we think of designing physical spaces, but you can use the same principles to shape your digital environment as well. For instance, a reader named Matthew wrote to me and said, “I significantly cut down on mindless Instagram time. Simply logging out of the app makes a big difference.”
Another reader named Viet went even further. “I used my laziness to my advantage with my bad habit of browsing Facebook. Deleting Facebook and having to go through the one extra step of going to the website and logging in manually was enough barrier for me not to get back on.”
And Rahul did something similar to kill his video game habit. “For gaming addiction, I removed my graphic card,” he wrote. “For excessive net surfing on mobile, I uninstalled apps and removed the Chrome browser.”
Environment Design, Part III
On the flip side, you can foster good habits by reducing the friction in your environment.
Natalie started picking up her cluttered clothes and building better cleaning habits simply by reducing the number of steps between her and the laundry basket. “I quit leaving my socks all over the floor by putting a little basket beside the door to collect them in.”
Similar strategies can be beneficial for building new exercise habits.
One reader named Justin sent me the following message: “I started going to a gym that was less than a mile from my house. This took away the time and inconvenience excuses. I was never consistent at exercise, but now I work out 8-10x a week. Crossfit, running, and cycling. I've been going strong for 2.5 years.”
I've even heard from readers who go to sleep wearing their running clothes. All they have to do is stumble out the door in the morning.
For more on environment design, see Chapters 6 and 12 of Atomic Habits.
Habit Substitution
In many cases, it can be more effective to replace your bad habit than merely trying to eliminate it.
The beautiful thing about habit substitution is that you can build a good habit and break a bad one simultaneously. One reader told me, “At home, I would go out to my backyard to smoke, so I put a weight bench out there, and every time I wanted to smoke, I'd go out and do some reps instead. After that, my craving was reduced.”
I thought the following idea was intriguing. One reader replaced biting their nails with cutting their nails. “I stopped biting my fingernails mostly by making sure clippers were always close at hand – especially at work.”
Many readers have substituted a new habit in a “stair-step” fashion. They gradually shift from the old pattern to something healthier.
Mark, for example, shared the following strategy. “I significantly cut back on beer consumption. I used flavored sparkling water to replace the beer, and I asked my wife to stop having a beer in the fridge for a while. Once I replaced the habit (it was mostly stress drinking after work), I was able to add beer back into my life.”
And another reader, also named Marc, similarly curtailed his drinking. “I replaced drinking beer every day in a succession of replacements, going through fruit juice, then iced tea, then seltzer water. I did it over about nine months by having one less drink a week. Once I finally quit, I got past the cravings in only two weeks. I haven’t had a drink in over a year now.”
Shawn used this approach to stop smoking. “I decided to quit smoking and used a fun-sized Snickers candy bar as a substitute until the major cravings went away. I'm still smoke-free years later.”
Mindset Tricks
Sometimes I like to employ clever little mental tricks to stick with a good habit.
One reader named Caelan wrote, “I quit smoking by assigning my cheat days progressively farther in the future. I never quit “for good,” I only quit until my next cheat day. This helped with cravings because the choice wasn’t between “right now” or “never,” it was “right now” or “later.”
Ken applied a similar strategy to his habit of eating fast food. “I started small when I quit bad habits like eating McDonald's all the time and drinking soda.
I told myself I’d take a week off, then said two weeks. That continued. This month, I made it four years without McDonald's and 15 months without soda.”
Another person used the Pointing-and-Calling strategy I discussed in Chapter 4. They wrote, “I quit smoking by saying a mantra out loud every time I wanted a cigarette (“your brain tricks you”) which I think changed my thinking from the subconscious part of my brain to the logical part.”
Qiana used a little math and a clever visual trick. “I stopped drinking soda,” she wrote. “I added up all the sodas I drank for the week and counted how many tablespoons of sugar were in those soda cans and bottles. I began to scoop the amount of sugar into an enormous bowl. The visual did it for me. I had to break that habit.”
Habit Tracking
Finally, I'd like to close with one of my favorite strategies: habit tracking.
Here's how a few readers are using it…
Cindy sent me an email saying, “I purchased a large wall calendar and started building the chains. This works for me. I like to make that chain.
There are six months of red X's on my calendar. I am healthier, have lost 30 pounds, feel stronger, exercise more, garden, read more, work on my small business, and practice my French.”
The easiest way to start tracking your habits is to use the templates provided in the Habit Journal. It will make the whole process a breeze.
My favorite approach is to pick a very tiny version of your habit and track that. For example, I have been following the practice of “reading 1 page” for the last month. One reader named Günter did something similar.
Author note
Hopefully, these short stories give you some ideas on how to build better habits in your own life. If you'd like to learn more about the strategies discussed above, check out Atomic Habits. And if you're interested in a notebook that makes it easier to build better habits, try the Habit Journal.
But no matter what, keep taking action in small ways each day. It is so gratifying for me to see people making real changes in their life because of these ideas. As always, thanks for reading.
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