How to form habits even if they feel monotonous & boring

In 2021, I paid off a mountain of loans, renovated a portion of my house, sold & bought the personal car, completed a boatload of paperwork, lost 10 KGs in weight, started a YouTube channel with 200k+ views, wrote 150+ articles, and excelled at my work.

In contrast in 2020, I only managed my work. (And gained a lot of weight)

The huge change was not only visible in results but also in my lifestyle.

In a way, I could form habits that I had always struggled with.

That was possible when I realized a weakness I had —

Monotony is a real obstacle to form habits

I am the type of person who seeks variety from every aspect of life.

Habits often get monotonous as they require us to do something for a seemingly endless period of time.

Because of that, I have had bouts of productivity but could never nail a habit.

In 2021, I realized that this phenomenon has gone on for too long. And it had to change.

That led me to analyze what made me tick and how I could use that to my advantage.

The combination that works for me

To uncover that, I tracked my previous successes to understand the common elements in them.

It might have been a job project, an exam, or a personal achievement. I wanted to find the underlying pattern that made it a success.

I found four things that made those instances different —

• A Clear goal
• With a deadline
• & a customized routine that outlined the road to that goal
• enabled by a conducive environment

For example, when I got into INSEAD MBA, I had a clear goal of getting in. I knew I had to apply by September of that year. Based on that, I divided all my deliverables into 10 steps. I communicated this to my peers and family so that I could have a conducive environment to do the work.

Ultimately, I succeeded when I had a clear project in mind.

That’s great but how to convert habit into a project?

Getting into a business school or a job is an obvious project.

I needed to convert habits into obvious projects. While that seemed unlikely in the beginning, the process became easier when I added a few elements into a habit.

• Add why & the result
• Introduce shorter deadlines
• Update routine regularly
• Maintain a supportive environment

By doing that, the potential habit of “Exercising for one hour five days a week” became “Exercise for one hour five days a week to lose 5 Kg weight in three months”

Just like that, a habit became a project.

After three months, I’d update the project and change the goal a little bit.

It also meant that my daily routine needed to be updated every month to accommodate the changing goals.

Let’s try with a few more, projects can form habits —

• Write daily — “Write for an hour every day to reach 50% more readers in January”
• Read every day — “Read for 30 minutes during commute every day to finish 5 books by May”
• Post regularly on Linkedin — “Post 3 times a week in Linkedin in January to reach at least 5000 views per post”

In all of these cases, it’s important to have a supportive environment. Have your dumbbells handy, keep the book in the car, have the LinkedIn app on your phone to ensure a conducive environment.

In the process of achieving these goals, the habits will get hardcoded into your lifestyle.

Final thoughts — Habits can indeed be monotonous

Most of us stay more motivated when there’s a deadline in place.

Deadlines can be motivating, so can be clear goals.

A habit without a clear goal is hard to continue. Because of that, why is essential.

By combining the why and the when you can remove the monotony from a habit and make that exciting instead.