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Habits Are Powerful, But Delicate. They Can Emerge Outside Our Consciousness, Or Can Be Deliberately Designed. They Often Occur Without Our Permission, But Can Be Reshaped By Fiddling With Their Parts. They Shape Our Lives Far More Than We Realize—they Are So Strong, In Fact, That They Cause Our Brains To Cling To Them At The Exclusion Of All Else, Including Common Sense.

-Charles Duhigg

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Habits Are Powerful, But

Charles Duhigg

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Habits Are Powerful, But Delicate. They Can Emerge Outside Our Consciousness, Or Can Be Deliberately Designed. They Often Occur Without Our Permission, But Can Be Reshaped By Fiddling With Their Parts. They Shape Our Lives Far More Than We Realize—they Are So Strong, In Fact, That They Cause Our Brains To Cling To Them At The Exclusion Of All Else, Including Common Sense.

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At Some Point, If You're Changing A Really Deep-seated Behavior, You're Going To Have A Moment Of Weakness.

The Problem Is That Your Brain Can't Tell The Difference Between Bad And Good Habits, And So If You Have A Bad One, It's Always Lurking There, Waiting For The Right Cues And Rewards.

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There's A Natural Instinct Embedded In Friendship, A Sympathy That Makes Us Willing To Fight For Someone We Like When They Are Treated Unjustly.

Natural Instinct

What We Know From Lab Studies Is That It's Never Too Late To Break A Habit. Habits Are Malleable Throughout Your Entire Life. But We Also Know That The Best Way To Change A Habit Is To Understand Its Structure - That Once You Tell People About The Cue And The Reward And You Force Them To Recognize What Those Factors Are In A Behavior, It Becomes Much, Much Easier To Change.

Most Of The Choices We Make Each Day May Feel Like The Products Of Well-considered Decision Making, But They’re Not. They’re Habits.

Belief Is Easier When It Occurs Within A Community.

Once You Understand That Habits Can Change, You Have The Freedom And The Responsibility To Remake Them. Once You Understand That Habits Can Be Rebuilt, The Power Of Habit Becomes Easier To Grasp And The Only Option Left Is To Get To Work.

Self-discipline Has A Bigger Effect On Academic Performance Than Does Intellectual Talent.

Research Suggests That Investment Bankers Are More Prone To Commit Fraud When They Feel The Competitor At Their Heels.

Rather, To Change A Habit, You Must Keep The Old Cue, And Deliver The Old Reward, But Insert A New Routine.

When A Habit Emerges, The Brain Stops Fully Participating In Decision Making. It Stops Working So Hard, Or Diverts Focus To Other Tasks. So Unless You Deliberately Fight A Habit -- Unless You Find New Routines -- The Pattern Will Unfold Automatically.

Hiding What You Know Is Sometimes As Important As Knowing It.

Some Say Because Music Is As Much About Personal Expression As Listening Pleasure, Sharing Is Integral To Why Songs Have Value In The First Place.

What Studies Say The Number One Best Way To Start An Exercise Habit Is To Give Yourself A Reward That You Genuinely Enjoy.

Companies Aren’t Families. They’re Battlefields In A Civil War.

When People Have A Willpower Failure, It's Because They Haven't Anticipated A Situation That's Going To Come Along.

The More You Focus, The More That Focus Becomes A Habit.

Then One Day, We’ll Put The Reward In The Old Place, And Put In The Rat, And, By Golloy, The Old Habit Will Rememerge Right Away. Habits Never Really Disappear. They’re Encoded Into The Sturctures Of Our Brain, And That’s A Huge Advantage For Us, Because It Would Be Awful If We Had To Relearn How To Drive After Every Vacation. The Problem Is That Your Brain Can’t Tell The Difference Between Bad And Good Habits, And So If You Have A Bad One, It’s Always Lurking There, Waiting For The Right Cues And Rewards.

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This Is The Real Power Of Habit: The Insight That Your Habits Are What You Choose Them To Be.

I Think I'm Smart, And I Know I Was A Good Mom. But There Wasn't A Lot I Could Point To And Say, That's Why I'm Special.

If You Believe You Can Change - If You Make It A Habit - The Change Becomes Real.

There’s Something About It That Makes Other Good Habits Easier.

However, To Modify A Habit, You Must Decide To Change It. You Must Consiously Accept The Hard Work Of Identifying The Cues And Rewards That Drive The Habits' Routines, And Find Alternatives. You Must Know You Have Control And Be Self-conscious Enough To Use It -- And Every Chapter In This Book Is Devoted To Illustrating A Different Aspect Of Why That Control Is Real.

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Cravings Are What Drive Habits. And Figuring Out How To Spark A Craving Makes Creating A New Habit Easier.

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As People Strengthened Their Willpower Muscles In One Part Of Their Lives—in The Gym, Or A Money Management Program—that Strength Spilled Over Into What They Ate Or How Hard They Worked. Once Willpower Became Stronger, It Touched Everything.

Since The 17th Century, Insurance Agents Have Been The Foremost Experts On Risk.

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A Movement Starts Because Of The Social Habits Of Friendship And The Strong Ties Between Close Acquaintances. It Grows Because Of The Habits Of A Community, And The Weak Ties That Hold Neighborhoods And Clans Together. And It Endures Because A Movement's Leaders Give Participants New Habits That Create A Fresh Sense Of Identity And A Feeling Of Ownership.

The Cooperation Of Nascar - Or Any Other System, It Turns Out - Persists Only When Everyone Believes He Has The Opportunity To Win.

Habits Are Powerful, But Delicate. They Can Emerge Outside Our Consciousness, Or Can Be Deliberately Designed. They Often Occur Without Our Permission, But Can Be Reshaped By Fiddling With Their Parts. They Shape Our Lives Far More Than We Realize—they Are So Strong, In Fact, That They Cause Our Brains To Cling To Them At The Exclusion Of All Else, Including Common Sense.

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