How to change bad habits and make good habits stick | Online Executive and Admin Assistant Training

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How to change bad habits and make good ones stick

Submitted by Ethan on October 02, 2009 at 03:40 PM

Habits can be both good AND bad.

smoking = bad habit; exercising = good habit; biting nails = bad habit; eating lots of greens = good habit… and the list goes on.

I’m not writing this post to try and get you to quit all of your bad habits and start a bunch of good habits; nope, I’m not that guy who throws stones at glass houses. The goal of this post is to point you to a habit changing cheat sheet which lists 29 ways to change a habit or form a new one IF you want to either stop a bad habit or start a good one.

I wish I had that list when I changed one of my habits not too long ago… you see, I bit my nails. I know, gross and UN-attractive but I couldn’t help myself… was doing it for years and years. It was something that I wanted to stop for a while but it took some time before I finally rid myself of that BAD habit. Don’t really know how exactly I did it but I do know that I “fell off the wagon” a couple of times until finally kicking it for good.

This list from Leo over at ZenHabits would have helped me through that process. At least now I’m better prepared for next time… and there will be a next time, I’m sure.

If you’re wondering what this has to do with executive assisting or admin assisting, you can create GOOD habits in your job that will close the cracks so nothing slips through AND makes you look like a superstar… things like: always calling to confirm appointments for the following day or always writing down the tasks given to you no matter how trivial or simple they are or making sure you update contact information right when it changes for anyone in your boss’s contact list… you get the idea.

Flickr Creative Commons image by miscpix

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