On your worst day, what would still feel doable?

Do you know this scenario: 1st of January or for next week — starting on Monday — you are going to change everything! Eat healthy, go to the gym, no more doomscrolling and so on. And come January 1st or Monday, nothing happens. You don't get up at 6am to work out at the gym for an hour, you don't cook the perfect meal, but find yourself on the couch — doomscrolling — seeing all the perfect people on social media doing the stuff you aren't doing. I don't know how many times this has happened to me with different goals, like working out regularly, going to the gym or upping my protein intake.

Why the all-or-nothing approach fails

But why doesn't this approach work? In the beginning, mostly before we even start, we are so motivated. Nothing can get in the way. What happens then? Well, life happens! Life gets in the way. And with this approach it's really easy to feel completely overwhelmed. Trying to change is a lot of stress for our nervous system, with the effect that body and mind just go back to what they are used to — the path of least resistance. And if there are too many changes we want to make, and we didn't even achieve the first thing, then everything falls apart. Then it's like: oh, that didn't work out, it doesn't even make sense anymore to start the rest.

New habits don't get built on willpower alone — willpower will only get you so far. So it's not your fault that it didn't work! The thing is to change the approach, as James Clear puts it in his book Atomic Habits: make the habit so small it seems impossible not to do it!

Make it tiny

Not: I will go to the gym every day for an hour, or I will do 20 push-ups. Instead, think about it this way: on your worst day, what would still feel doable? Something like moving for 2 minutes, or doing 1 push-up. Your body needs to know that it can trust you and you have to build that trust by showing up. Take the goal of going to the gym every day for an hour — it already sounds really difficult, doesn't it? But moving for 2 minutes, that sounds doable. Each small win gives your brain a little hit of dopamine — the feel-good messenger that makes you want to do it again. And your body starts to trust you. It's the little but regular steps that get you to your goal. Not the one-off huge effort.

So how to start? Think about the most important thing you want to change right now, your most important goal. Eating healthier, exercising more, integrating more mindfulness practices into your day or whatever is most important to you right now. Then think about how to reduce the first step of your goal to something you can achieve in 2 minutes maximum — eat an apple a day, move for 2 minutes per day, sit down to meditate for 2 minutes per day.

Habit stacking

Then think about how to habit stack it. We tend to forget new habits we want to integrate — they are not in our default network yet. So we have to help ourselves remember them. And that's where habit stacking comes in: eat the apple after your lunch, move those 2 minutes after having your coffee in the morning, meditate after brushing your teeth at night. And here’s what helps me in the beginning: putting sticky notes up where I can see them — on the bathroom mirror, the fridge, the water filter, the door.

Be kind to yourself

And, very important: don't be so hard on yourself. Getting used to new habits and integrating them into your life takes time and, initially, a lot of energy! Our body and mind love to go back to default mode — it's easier and saves a lot of energy. Be curious instead of judging yourself. Notice how the new habit makes you feel. Forgot to do it yesterday? No problem, just do it today, and tomorrow, and the day after that. And maybe you will discover that after a few days you don't move for 2 minutes, but for 3. Or you not only have your apple, but also choose the sweet potatoes instead of the white bread. Or you sit there and meditate for 5 minutes.

You don't have to change your whole life from one day to the next. Just start with two minutes — and watch those initial 2 minutes change your life!

So what is your 2-minute habit going to be?