Habits are powerful. Implementing the right ones in your days can be completely life-changing and push you towards success and achieving your goals. There are so many books written on the power of habits, and how they can be implemented in your life to truly make a change. However, there are also bad habits, that usually we subconsciously pick up, and today I want to focus on those. In this blog post, I’ll share 5 bad habits you need to break today and how to break them.

3. NOT SETTING BOUNDARIES.

This is also something I’ve struggled with for a loooong time, and it’s not as straightforward as it seems to find a solution. What does a lack of boundaries look like? It looks like saying yes to every single thing someone asks you to do. It looks like not having set work hours and doing everything all the time. It looks like trying to please everybody. It looks like never making the time to take care of yourself. Sound familiar? I know, because I’ve been there too. The problem with this is that many people don’t even realise they lack boundaries, but they constantly feel overwhelmed and burned out, and that definitely doesn’t help when you’re trying to be productive and successful with your goals.

4. MULTITASKING.

You know when you’re working on your laptop, watching the news, and talking to your friend, all at the same time? Guess what, IT DOESN’T WORK. In fact, when you’re constantly switching from one activity to another, your brain gets tired and your productivity decreases. BUT, I’m all here for doing multitasking in the right way, and that looks like combining one task that requires your mental focus, with one that you can do on autopilot or mindlessly. If you’re not sure what I’m talking about, read my blog post on how to multitask in the right way, and by implementing that strategy you will definitely see a difference in your productivity and focus.

5. NEGLECTING YOUR HEALTH.

You might be wondering what this has to do with productivity, but the truth is that health has to do with EVERYTHING. Your body is like a car, if you don’t treat it right, fuel it right, and do the regular maintenance, sooner or later it will break down. We can really take our bodies for granted until we get sick, and all we wish is to have our health back. The same goes for taking care of your mental health; if you don’t take time to do the inner work and check-in with yourself regularly, you will be driving yourself towards a burn-out point, and no one likes that. So if you want to be productive on a daily basis, there’s no way you can do that without taking care of your body and mind.

How to overcome bad habits

I’m not just going to list the problems and leave them like that, I also want to provide you with some solutions so you can start working on them. The key when it comes to implementing new habits or breaking old ones is to start small. Going small will help you be consistent and more motivated until you can gradually increase them.

1. Instead of grabbing your phone when you wake up or use it until you fall asleep, try to put it somewhere that can’t easily be reached from your bed, and then get in bed. You can read, meditate, or whatever you want to do, without the need of staring at your screen all the time. I recommend you create a morning and night routine so that you can have a structure and create better habits that don’t include your phone. Read my blog post on how to create the best morning routine.

2. If you struggle to remember to drink water, try to always keep a glass of water or a water bottle where you can see it. And as an extra tip, you might even want to set up an alarm regularly to remind you to drink every so often, so that you really can’t forget it.

3. Start setting small boundaries depending on your lifestyle. Start saying no to things that don’t add to your life but only drain you, determine and stick to your work hours and don’t do any more work after that, set regular time aside to rest and recharge so that you can be the best version of yourself and make the most of your energy to be as productive as you can be.

4. Stop engaging in activities that require you to focus on all of them, at the same time. Instead, try time-blocking so you can work on one single task at a time, or try to improve your time management by combining tasks that can be combined, as I shared on my blog post here.

5. Set goals to take care of your health every day. Do some exercise, as short as it seems; eat healthy and nutritious food; take your vitamins, get enough sleep, journal regularly, talk to a therapist if you need to. Whatever you need to do to truly be the best you.