How to Break Bad Habits Stress-Free
Few things in life are more reliably stressful than bad habits—the kind that you know are bad, that you would really prefer to live without, but which keep on coming back to you regardless. Dopamine addiction, for example, is a large and growing problem today, in the age of the internet. Not only does this cause physiological stress, but it often seems to put a wall around the continuous, flourishing growth that ought to be the normal state of affairs in life.
At time of writing, there are approximately four and a half gazillion books, podcasts, programs, therapies, and devices designed to help you cope with or eliminate bad habits… and that’s really part of the problem. Because a lot of these aren’t good, and how are you supposed to know which ones are good and which aren’t? It takes willpower to try and break a bad habit, and you only have so much of that. Not enough to try even five percent of what’s available.
Now, I’m not going to claim that a 500 word blog post will solve everything. But what I do hope to achieve is to name a few simple steps that really do help take some of the burden away from these things, without relying too much on willpower.
My first and foremost suggestion is one I have mentioned with increasing frequency in the past few weeks: turn it into a prayer. I should clarify right away that I don’t mean a guilt-ridden, sackcloth-and-ashes, God-have-mercy-on-me kind of prayer. There may be a time for that, but not during the normal course of a day. What I mean is to simply take whatever is going through your mind at that point—frustration, anger, desire, and what have you—and rephrase it as a prayer. If you do not believe in God, then leave Him out of it and think of it instead as speaking directly to your unconscious mind, which I believe is the same as what scripture calls “the heart.” This really can work wonders if you’re diligent enough to make a habit of it. Not only does it banish negativity, but it’s a constant reminder of your better self, the self you are trying to develop. I can’t talk about this enough, but I’ll move on for now.
Awareness of patterns is another big one. Simple, I know, but sometimes common advice is common for a reason. A person can’t do anything without a corresponding neural pathway. Every time you do something new for the first time, that’s a new pathway. As specific pathways become more well-traveled, the corresponding actions become easier, more automatic, even involuntary.
The key thing is that none of these involuntary responses exists in a vacuum. It’s always a response to some kind of stimuli. If there’s a specific spot in the house where you most often find yourself tempted—a computer chair, for example—even something as simple as rearranging the furniture may be a great help. Avoiding the trigger is often easier than fighting the temptation. My son, Harry, recently switched to writing on an old-fashioned word processor (ask your parents) and has been more prolific than ever in the months since.
Lastly, and most obviously, healing wrong memories and bad patterns is what the codes are best at. I know of nothing better, in terms of therapeutic modalities, and we have free options available, so there’s no excuse! Pay us a visit and see what it can do for you.
Have a blessed, wonderful day!
Dr. Alex Loyd
