Summary: Forming new habits take time (Dr. Phillippa Lally's famous study out of the University College London noted on average, it takes 66 days before a new behavior becomes automatic). But, the awesome thing is that when you can form new habits, that's how people really become experts and actually happier. They're getting the things done that are important to them. Once they form a habit, then they can move on to something else to get even better. Whether it's for exercise or it's for doing something at work and forming a new productivity habit, it's super important. I have “partner in crime” who is incredibly important to me in forming new habits and also in being accountable. Kona is a 3 year-old American Labrador Retriever, and she is my accountability partner to go running four days a week. I don't want to say she's annoying. Let's just say that she's persistent. Whether it's for exercise or it's for something at work (for example you need to practice for a big presentation coming up in a few weeks) it’s super important to have an accountability partner. There's a couple different types of accountability. The best one I find is to have someone physically do something with you. In relation to Kona, she is my accountability partner because she's very persistent and she will not let my day go on until we go for a run. As my accountability partner, Kona and I dthe running together. Another way that you can be accountable to form new habits is to verbalize to someone. Back to our earlier example of the big presentation, let’s say you must practice for a presentation 15 minutes a day. You can either… A) have your accountability partner come with you and practice with them (which is ideal) or B) if you can't do that, you can put your accountability partner on notice and say, "Hey, I have this big presentation coming up and it’s very important. I need to practice 15 minutes a day and I'm just going to call you in the morning and let you know when I'm going to start doing this." Have someone help you out that way. A third way that you can be accountable is to yourself. That would be to write it down. You might jot on a piece of paper (again, if it's for work) “I'm going to begin practicing for my big presentation each day at 9:00am until 9:15am. It’s not only important for you to write that down once, you should do it every day and put it somewhere where you can see it. Forming new habits can empower you to become an expert quicker and be happier. I venture to say that because when we’re getting things done and we're accountable, we naturally become more proficient, we tend to be more happy. That is really important too. The one secret today for you to form new habits quicker is to get accountable: 1. Be accountable with someone and to physically do what you're going to do with them … and/or 2. Verbalize it to someone and do that every day until it becomes a habit … and/or 3. Be accountable to yourself by writing something down and viewing it every day.
