In this chapter, we are going to discuss your triggers. Triggers are really interesting psychological elements. Triggers are things that happen in our lives that evoke an emotion, an action, a behavior or a thought.
You have experienced triggers throughout most of your life and you may not even have realized it. For example, when a certain song comes on the radio it may evoke a very specific memory. When you think of a specific moment in your life it may give you a very specific feeling about that moment.
Your good and bad habits work on these very same triggers. For example, someone that is trying to quit smoking often has to deal with the physiological trigger of the smell of cigarette smoke. This can create an almost irresistible urge to smoke again.
The Good & Bad Triggers
So, you have two tasks when it comes to cultivating habits to help you reach your goals. First of all, you need to realize that negative habits shouldn’t be stopped, but replaced. We discussed this at length in Chapter Four. Second, you need to identify negative triggers and create positive ones so that you can have an action plan for avoiding negative habits and triggering positive ones.
Creating Good Triggers & Identifying Bad Ones
If you want to create good habits then you are going to have to create good triggers. Good triggers are things that you teach yourself that prompt positive actions.
For example, an instance was mentioned earlier in this book where you lay in bed thinking about the germs and disease that was incubating in your mouth to trigger yourself to go brush your teeth. This would be considered a pre-action state, which is one of five techniques for building positive triggers detailed below.
Trigger Technique One: Scheduling
This is probably the most popular way to trigger a positive action. Just about everyone has some kind of schedule that they have to follow, and scheduling can be a great reminder that you need to take action.
Scheduling doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to choose a particular time to set an alarm in order to trigger your positive action. There are several ways that you can go about it. You could create a to do list and refer to it throughout the day or you could plan to take your action directly after lunch, no matter what time you actually take your lunch.
When it comes to negative triggers, just be aware of patterns that you know lead to bad habits around certain times of the day. For example, if you find yourself binge eating during evening TV watching, you can take steps to replace that ice cream or platter of chicken wings with something healthier.
Trigger Technique Two: The Pre-Action State
This is the state that you are in before you actually take the action – whether good or bad. One example is the going to bed and thinking about the health of your teeth because you didn’t brush. Another example might be when you start thinking about what fast food restaurant sounds good today, you can step in and replace that fast food thought with something healthier.
However, the pre-action state doesn’t just apply to thoughts; it can also apply to emotions. It is a true fact that when you are in a certain emotional state, you are prone to triggering actions, both good and bad. You can see this in many addictions, where depression, euphoria or anger may trigger an addiction response.
Trigger Technique Three: The Preceding Event
Perhaps one of your goals is to check your phone less. This is a perfect example of a trigger event that precedes your habit or action. When your phone goes off, you pick it up and check the messages, even if it is nothing more important than Rhianna tweeting about how much she loves chocolate.
Preceding events can be triggers for negative actions, but they can also easily be turned around so that an event triggers an action. One of the best ways to do this is to tie the new habit to an action that is already habitual.
For example, when you have a habit that is already deeply ingrained (drinking your morning coffee, brushing your teeth) you can tie a new habit to the old and make something that you already do every day your trigger action.
Trigger Technique Four: Your Current Location
Sometimes, you can use a specific location to trigger an action that you are trying to make habitual. Your environment can be a powerful ally (and enemy) when it comes to creating habits because we are so used to our environments controlling what we do.
For example, when we’re in the family room, we watch television. When we’re in the dining room, we eat. When you’re at the office – you work. The list goes on and on. You can make specific locations work for you when it comes to building habits but you need to keep a couple of things in mind.
First of all, you can’t make the location too general. For example, if you choose your office building as a trigger location you are never going to trigger the action because you spend eight hours there. Either that, or you can trigger the action over and over, and that can get frustrating and counterproductive as well.
The other thing to keep in mind is that you want to keep your actions simple and reasonable. If your trigger location is an intersection that you pass by on your way to work, don’t try to do an entire Spanish lesson triggered by that location. Instead, choose something like quick self-affirmations that you can recite over the next few blocks.
Trigger Number Five: Your Friends and Family
Your friends and family probably have more of an impact on your life than you’d like to admit. Do you do things differently when your parents are in town? If you go to the bar with your buddies, do you order a beer, even if you would rather have a soda pop?
Rather than allowing your friends to unconsciously affect your habits, use them to trigger positive ones. If you go to the bar with friends and you are trying to cut down on alcohol, then actively choose something else. Use that person or group as a trigger for a positive action.
