I've read James Clear's blog for the last couple years. This book is the culmination and synthesis of a lot of his writing. Anyone with an interest in creating good habits and eliminating bad ones needs this. It's broken down into a few simple principles to make any habit stick. It's an easy read, and there are some great stories in here about how small changes lead to outsized results.
Key Takeaways
Memorable Quotes
Rating: 9/10
This book is super practical. Anyone can use these principles to improve themselves or their teams. I'll return to this anytime I want to change my habits.
Key Takeaways
- To make a habit easy, make it obvious.
- To make a habit hard, make it invisible.
- Make good habits attractive.
- Make bad habits unattractive.
- Make good habits easy.
- Make bad habits difficult.
- Make good habits satisfying.
- Make bad habits unsatisfying.
Memorable Quotes
- We imitate the habits of three groups in particular: The close. The many. The powerful.
- You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.
- Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. No single instance will transform your beliefs, but as the votes build up, so does the evidence of your new identity.
- You should be far more concerned with your current trajectory than with your current results.
- Some people spend their entire lives waiting for the time to be right to make an improvement.
- The more pride you have in a particular aspect of your identity, the more motivated you will be to maintain the habits associated with it. If you’re proud of how your hair looks, you’ll develop all sorts of habits to care for and maintain it. If you’re proud of the size of your biceps, you’ll make sure you never skip an upper-body workout. If you’re proud of the scarves you knit, you’ll be more likely to spend hours knitting each week. Once your pride gets involved, you’ll fight tooth and nail to maintain your habits.
- The purpose of setting goals is to win the game. The purpose of building systems is to continue playing the game. True long-term thinking is goal-less thinking. It’s not about any single accomplishment. It is about the cycle of endless refinement and continuous improvement. Ultimately, it is your commitment to the process that will determine your progress.
- Good habits can make rational sense, but if they conflict with your identity, you will fail to put them into action.
- Habits are the compound interest of self-improvement.
- Over the long run, however, the real reason you fail to stick with habits is that your self-image gets in the way. This is why you can't get too attached to one version of your identity. Progress requires unlearning. Becoming the best version of yourself requires you to continuously edit your beliefs, and to upgrade and expand your identity.
- This is why remaining part of a group after achieving a goal is crucial to maintaining your habits. It’s friendship and community that embed a new identity and help behaviors last over the long run.
Rating: 9/10
This book is super practical. Anyone can use these principles to improve themselves or their teams. I'll return to this anytime I want to change my habits.