“Most of the choices we make each day may feel like the products of well-considered decision making, but they’re not. They’re habits.”

Charles Duhigg

We are what we repeatedly do. What we repeatedly do are our habits.

We have been repeatedly told that the secret of success is found in our daily activities and that if you want to change your life you must change something that you do daily.

I initially bought the power of habit because, why not. I was not as excited about reading the book as I usually am with other books. Before I read the book I thought that it was one of those overrated books that has a million pages of very repeative information that you could easily google.

I was way, way off. The book turned out to be pretty great. Even better than pretty great. It’s my favourite book so far.

The power of habit is an extremely fascinating self-help book. It explores very intriguing studies that will make you say ‘WOW!!’ and ‘I’ve never thought about this before’ and ‘How is that even possible?!’

If our habits are automatic and they determine our success. So if you have bad habits, are you doomed to fail?? Absolutely not, habits may be automatic but we actually have a choice on what behaviour becomes a habit.

To understand how our brains create habits, Charles introduces the habit loop :

So yes we can change of our bad habits and create good ones by isolating the cue, routine and reward and manipulating them. To replace a bad habit with a good one, Charles suggests keeping the cue and reward and changing the routine.

In order for a behaviour to become totally automatic there is something else that you have to factor in, a craving. The behaviour must be second nature to the point that you crave it. Yes, it’s totally possible to crave exercising.

One of the things I loved about this book is how practical it is. The things Charles talks about in his book are totally applicable to your daily life.

How this book changed my life :

I did not just read the power of habit for the sake of reading it. I actually followed some of Charles’s advice that is applicable to me.

Firstly I started noticing all the habits I have.

Sometimes we become so used to doing something that we don’t even realize that we are doing it.

I then acknowledged all the habits that I have and made changes to the ones that were no longer serving me.

Secondly, in the book Mr Duhigg said something very interesting. He said that when things get tough our routines and our habits fall apart and we go back to what is comfortable to us.

And looking back at my life he was so right. Generally I live a great life that is held together by my good habits. I workout almost daily, drink at 3 litres of water daily, read one book a week, journal weekly and get 8 hours of sleep.

When I tell you that all of that disappears around exam season I mean all of that disappears around exam season. During exam season all my good habits escape me. I don’t workout, don’t drink any water and I barely sleep.

I didn’t like that. I wanted to make my healthy habits what was comfortable for me. I wanted my healthy habits to be what keeps me going during tough times.

In order for your good habits to truly last you have to crave them. I had to crave working out, drinking water and all these other things. I can now confidently tell you that I crave working out. I look forward to my daily exercise.

I no longer fall apart during exam season, at least not as much as I used to.

So yeah this book changed my life and it can change yours too.

I highly recommend that you grab this book and change your habits which in turn will change your life.

I know this review is a month and three days late, thank you so much for patiently waiting for it.

For next month’s book, I want to do Think like a monk and Unbecoming to become. I haven’t decided which one it will be. Or maybe I can do both.

Please let me which one I should do next month : Think like a monk or Unbecoming to become.