Upholders respond readily to both outer expectations and inner expectations. Questioners question all expectations, and will meet an expectation only if they believe it’s justified. Obligers respond r...
Upholders may struggle in situations where expectations aren't clear or the rules aren't established. They may feel compelled to meet expectations, even ones that seem pointless. They may feel uneasy...
Unlike a reward, which must be earned or justified, a treat is a small pleasure or indulgence that we give to ourselves just because we want it.
UPHOLDER/Obligers must be sure to articulate inner expectations and to create boundaries to protect inner expectations from outer interference.
To achieve greater clarity in my actions, I often invoke a bright-line rule, a useful concept from law. A bright-line rule is a clearly defined rule or standard that eliminates any need for interpreta...
This was exactly what I had noticed about the stopping aspect of First Steps. When we try a new habit for the first time, it feels full of promise, even if it’s arduous. But most of that excitement is...
This freedom from decision making is crucial, because when I have to decide—which often involves resisting temptation or postponing gratification—I tax my self-control.
Think about appearances. I wanted my apartment to be less cluttered, and also to look less cluttered.
There’s no magic formula—not for ourselves, and not for the people around us. We won’t make ourselves more creative and productive by copying other people’s habits, even the habits of geniuses; we mus...
There's a great satisfaction in knowing that we've made good use of our days, that we've lived up to our expectations of ourselves.
There are times in the lives of most of us, observed William Edward Hartpole Lecky, when we would have given all the world to be as we were but yesterday, though that yesterday had passed over us unap...
The words of the writer Colette had haunted me for years: What a wonderful life I’ve had! I only wish I’d realized it sooner.
The second reason rewards pose a danger for habits is that they require a decision. A habit, by my definition, is something we do without decision making.
The reward of a thing well done is to have done it. —Ralph Waldo Emerson, New England Reformers
The fact is, while some habits are almost unbreakable, some habits remain fragile, even after years. We must guard against anything that might weaken a valuable habit. Every added link in the chain st...
The Strategy of Safeguards requires us to take a very realistic—perhaps even fatalistic—look at ourselves. But while acknowledging the likelihood of temptation and failure may seem like a defeatist ap...
See the child you have, as the saying goes, not the child you wish you had. In the end, I agreed with Michel de Montaigne: The least strained and most natural ways of the soul are the most beautiful;...
Same person, same activity, different habit.
Research—and my own experience—suggests that the less we indulge in something, the less we want it. When we believe that a craving will remain unsatisfied, it may diminish; cravings are more provoked...
Rather than striving for a particular level of possessions—minimal or otherwise—it’s helpful to think about getting rid of what’s superfluous. Even people who prefer to own many possessions enjoy thei...