Skill Builder No. 26: Stopping a Bad Habit

Skills Guide Content

Goal: Strategies to change unwanted behaviors

Stopping a bad habit is a very frustrating process, particularly because habits don’t have to be thought through. They are automatic, and come from muscle memory.

Instead of criticizing a bad habit, help them put something into place that will interrupt the automatic actions. If your student wants to improve sleep by not checking their phone (and reducing bright lights at night), then moving the phone charging cord to a different area of the room is a natural way to interrupt the negative habit. Any obstacle they can enact is effective at helping remember the desired change.

Activity from Planner

If you want to drop a habit (like using your phone in bed), you must change earlier in the evening routine. To successfully change that routine, you may need to move your charger away from your bed to a different side of the room.

Extended Activity

Human brains are great at doing routines, but stopping a bad habit is hard for our minds. If you want to drop a habit (like using your phone in bed), you must change earlier in the evening routine. To successfully change that routine, you may need to move your charger away from your bed to a different side of the room. You could power it down, turn it off and set it on your nightstand. Doing so ensures it won’t open up immediately if you pick it up. Interrupting your routine is just making one thing different to remind yourself about the new habit you want to establish.

Here are some ideas of how that can work for different routines:

• Want to go to bed on time? Set an alarm to start getting ready for bed instead of waiting to get ready til later.
• Want to get up earlier? Put your alarm across the room so you have to get up to turn it off.
• Want to be more talkative with your family in the evening? Take ten minutes to yourself, alone, quiet, and not doing anything to give your brain a chance to re-charge before hanging out with your family.

Now it’s your turn. Write out one thing you want to stop doing and the action you can take now to make sure it happens later.

Download Resources