The Importance of Habit Formation
Most people come to our gyms seeking help to change their habits – or help maintain good habits that they’ve already established.
Our job is to make it easy for them to do this, by coaching and guiding them through the process of habit formation, while also helping to reduce barriers to success. A lot has been written about goal setting and habit formation, so we can draw on a vast body of scientific literature to back up ‘the practice’ with ‘the theory’.
Habit change usually occurs when somebody wants to change something about their life; or if they have a goal they want to reach. As we learned in the previous section, the process of habit formation isn’t immediate, and it can be difficult.
In his book Atomic Habits, James Clear proves just how important habits are.
Practical Application
The impact created by a change in your habits is similar to the effect of shifting the route of an airplane by just a few degrees.
Imagine you’re flying from London to Tokyo. If the pilot were to adjust the heading just a few degrees, you could land in Australia. Such a small change is barely noticeable at takeoff—the nose of the airplane moves just a few feet—but when magnified across the globe, you end up hundreds of miles apart.
Similarly, a slight change in a person’s daily habits can guide their life to a very different destination. Making a choice that is 1 percent better or 1 percent worse seems insignificant in the moment, but over the span of moments that make up a lifetime, these choices determine the difference between who you are and who you could be.
Key Takeaway
Success is the product of daily habits—not once-in-a-lifetime transformations. As the assessor, it’s crucial that you understand this, are able to communicate it to your clients, and are able to support them in putting it into practice.