Often when clients talk to me about their habits, they say things like, “I need to tighten up,” or “I’ve gotten off track, I need to do better.” While I admire their self-awareness and desire to improve, they usually focus too much on willpower, and trying to force healthy choices. Then they wonder why they stay on track for a few weeks or months, only to fall right back into old bad habits when life gets busy. We can make an intentional effort to do better, but our brains are wired to look for shortcuts. Brains love efficiency and routine, and prefer to operate mostly on autopilot. This blog post is about how to use that to your advantage.
The easier, most comfortable a choice is for our brain, the more likely we are to do it. You think it is a willpower issue. You successfully avoid the donuts at the morning meeting, and you order a salad at lunch while your coworkers eat fries. But then you work late, miss a deadline, sit in traffic, and argue with your kid about addition problems in her math homework because she’s convinced you're the one who is doing it wrong.
By dinnertime, nothing is defrosted, you are starving, and you simply don't have the mental or physical resources left to cook (let alone clean up after). So, you order takeout. It’s easy, and it solves an immediate problem. Your family is hungry, you are tired, and you figure your willpower for the day is all used up. The thought of cooking and doing dishes is just too heavy to bear tonight. You promise yourself you’ll do better tomorrow, but tomorrow brings more of the same.
This is a normal human reaction to the modern world. You were simply solving a problem. In fact, all behavior is an attempt to solve a problem. You were behaving resourcefully by feeding your family and conserving your limited energy. I’m not making excuses for you (or me), this is how our brains work. Don’t spend two minutes feeling guilty; let’s use that time wasted on guilt by accepting what’s out of our control, then manage what we can by shaping our environment in our favor.
Meet your Elephant and its Rider
Have you ever heard of the metaphor of the elephant, the rider, and the path? This idea was first introduced to me in the book Switch by Chip and Dan Heath. Picture a man riding an elephant. The man in this metaphor represents your logical, thinking brain. Of course, you want to eat only healthy food, exercise five days a week, drink 75 ounces of water a day, sleep eight hours, and get plenty of recovery. Who wouldn’t want all that? The logical brain decides exactly what it will do starting TOMORROW. The elephant, however, represents the emotional, impulse-driven part of your brain. The man might feel in control, and the elephant may go along for a while, but no matter what the man plans, once the elephant wants a different direction, the man has no choice but to follow. The only way the man can control the elephant is to shape his path. And that is what we are going to talk about today: shaping the path so that when your logical mind and your emotional mind conflict, you naturally default to the easier, healthier option.
The easiest way to change behavior is to first shape the path. What is the path? It is your environment. But when you hear health coaches talk about environment, you usually only hear about putting fruit on the counter, and sweets out of sight, leaving your shoes by the front door, or sleeping in your running clothes. While yes, those are all parts of your environment that you can shape, your environment goes a lot deeper.
The EIGHT Layers of Your Environment
(In this post, we’re digging into the first four layers, the ones closest to you. Because I’m long-winded (hah) and I don’t want to overwhelm you with too much at once, we’ll tackle the last four layers next week!)
Layer 1: Your Body.
This closest layer includes anything you are wearing, holding, or carrying. Does the phone in your hand make it easier or harder to practice your healthy habits? Perhaps you use a helpful app to track your food or keep a coach just a click away. Or maybe you are doom-scrolling and cannot seem to put the screen down to get to bed. What else is in this layer? Think about what you wear. If you are required to dress in a suit and heels for work, you probably will not do bodyweight squats between meetings. That wouldn’t be practical or advisable. On the flip side, a new exercise outfit might encourage you to get to the gym. What about your headphones? Do they pump you up with energizing music or leave you beaten down by stressful world news podcasts? Does your smartwatch motivate you to get steps, or make you feel guilty for being stuck in back-to-back meetings? There is no right or wrong here. The goal is simply to build awareness of how the items that touch your body act as triggers that either help or hinder your progress. Before we move on, think about it: What in this first layer of your environment is helping you right now, and what might be hindering you?
Layer 2: Within Reach.
What can you grab with little to no movement? If your water bottle is filled and next to your computer, you are much more likely to hit your hydration goals today than if it’s empty on the top shelf in the pantry. If you have a bowl of candy on your desk, well, if you’re like me, those suckers aren’t surviving the afternoon. Is your desk cluttered, or organized for clear thinking and calm presence? Think about this layer. What is one small change you can make right here? Keeping healthy snacks on your desk, or keeping no snacks on your desk at all? Keeping your water bottle filled? Adding a sticky note reminder to use your stand-up desk (am I the only one who forgets? ha).
Layer 3: Your Room.
This encompasses the specific space you are in and its organization. This might be where a kitchen cabinet reorganization comes into play: putting healthy foods in plain sight on the counters and at eye level in the pantry. To make harder things harder, you can add physical obstacles to this layer. Put the sweet snacks on a shelf you can only reach with a step ladder (or leave them at the store)! This layer is also where you lay out your gym clothes or pack your gym bag. Or meal prepping for busy nights. By organizing the room so your healthy choices are highly visible and convenient, you give your brain an easy shortcut and help direct that elephant’s path.
Layer 4: Your Place.
This layer is your entire home, the building where you work, or the broader place you are currently occupying. Places often have spoken or unspoken rules and safety factors that can either help or inhibit your behavior. Do they stock the office vending machines with Snickers bars and potato chips, or nuts and protein bars? When I worked a corporate job, I’d often get “jokes” from co-workers about taking short walks throughout the day: “Don’t you have work to do?” or “Every time I'm out here, you're out here!” This set an expectation, an unspoken rule, that walking around was not okay . Think about your place: Who lives in your house with you? What are their views on healthy practices? Who do you work with? Who do you spend the most time with? Other people can influence our actions through their support or demands on our time. Because of this, negotiating for what you need, like quiet time or help with chores, is one way to shape the path.
While you can’t always pick and choose your co-workers (or family members, ha!) or demand healthier food options in the cafeteria, you can shape this environment by being intentional. Spend time with like-minded people, or be the trailblazer by asking if anyone wants to walk with you at lunch. We don’t have full control over our "place," but thinking about what could be helping and what could be holding you back is the first step toward change. And we’re only halfway there, who knew your environment was SO expansive!
TAKE ACTION
If we go back to the elephant-and-the-rider metaphor, are there a few steps you can take today to shape the path? The rider (the mind) understands the layers of environment, and the elephant (the impulses) only cares about the path immediately in front of it. Do smokers not know smoking is bad for their health? Of course they do. A smoker knows the health risks, but if their Within Reach layer always includes a pack of cigarettes and their Place layer has other people around who smoke, you can see how the path makes it easy to keep smoking and harder to quit. Knowing that something is unhelpful (such as smoking, poor eating, or avoiding exercise) rarely changes our behavior.
Knowledge alone does not inspire people to change. Action is everything. The bridge between knowing and doing can start with a single change. What is one small thing you can change in your environment today to make a good habit easier or a bad habit harder?
Next week, we’re stepping outside your front door to look how bigger world can impact your behavior when we tackle the next four layers of your environment. Stay tuned for part two!
Lea
There is no greater compliment than a referral!
Have I helped you? Leave a Google Review here
Lea Genders is a board-certified health coach, personal trainer, and workplace wellness consultant based in Fort Worth, TX. She offers corporate wellness programs for employee health and productivity, as well as in-person and virtual training / coaching for individuals worldwide. Her blog shares expert guidance on strength training, running, and sustainable nutrition @fortworth_trainer
Stop trying to force healthy choices. If you ever wonder why your willpower seems to vanish by 6:00 PM, it’s not your fault. The environment around you is likely dictating your actions. In Part 1 of this series, we go way beyond the typical pantry clean out to look at the first four layers of your environment and how to shape a path that helps your habits stick.