Behavior change is hard. This month I read in a book called The Joy of Leadership about a tactic that can help us with the changes we want to make in our lives.
There are moments in each one of our lives where we feel particularly inspired to change something. Several years back, as I have written before my wife and I wanted to have a family motto and incorporated deep meaning for us. That motto became “Nicholls Climb Mountains”. Our kids were quite young at the time, and I wanted this to stick so I created a logo / image / icon to help us all remember our family motto and to act accordingly.
Since then, we have created stickers, computer backgrounds, t-shirts, and hats with our family motto logo on them. It has served as a reminder to me and my family of what we stand for.
Tal and Angus in The Joy of Leadership recommend the tactic of creating a ritual, icon, image, or some type of reminder for the behavior change you are trying to implement. When life hits hard and you are not as inspired as you were when you wanted to change your behavior, you could use this ritual or image as a reminder of the change you are trying to make.
Our family repeats “Nicholls Climb Mountains” often and it reminds me to be resilient, to work hard, and put first things first and it is always visible in my office somewhere and is the background of my phone.
What do you want to change? What ritual, icon, image, or reminder can you put in your life to help you remember to make that change?
Take some time today 5-10 minutes reflecting on the biggest change you are trying to make in your life right now. What behavior is needed from you to make that change? Write down that behavior and see if there is something you can create to serve as a reminder to help you make that change.
I have found PowerPoint has great icons and tools to help with creating images and icons. Canva is another tool that could be used to quickly create an image.
