This is the book I read a long time ago, and this is the book that affected me so profoundly.
I am still using the lessons I learned from the “Atomic Habits” book.
If you are a book lover and still haven’t read “Atomic Habits,” I am telling you, you are missing out on a lot of things. This is a book full of knowledge, and even if you have read a summary of the book or even a summary of every chapter of the book, still, you are still missing a lot.
Because I did read summaries of “Atomic Habits” from a lot of websites and watched a lot of videos, still, no videos gave me that satisfaction.
You can see I can’t express my feelings in words.
This book uses simple language, which I liked the most because personally, I like books that I can read easily.
Every line of this book is superb. Every word from this book is full of information.
Total pages of this book: 256
CONTENTS:
The Fundamentals
Why Tiny Changes Make a Big Difference
1 The Surprising Power of Atomic Habits
2 How Your Habits Shape Your Identity (and Vice Versa)
3 How to Build Better Habits in 4 Simple Steps
The 1st Law
Make It Obvious
4 The Man Who Didn’t Look Right
5 The Best Way to Start a New Habit
6 Motivation Is Overrated; Environment Often Matters More
7 The Secret to Self-Control
The 2nd Law
Make It Attractive
8 How to Make a Habit Irresistible
9 The Role of Family and Friends in Shaping Your Habits
10 How to Find and Fix the Causes of Your Bad Habits
The 3rd Law
Make It Easy
11 Walk Slowly, but Never Backward
12 The Law of Least Effort
13 How to Stop Procrastinating by Using the Two-Minute Rule
14 How to Make Good Habits Inevitable and Bad Habits Impossible
The 4th Law
Make It Satisfying
15 The Cardinal Rule of Behavior Change
16 How to Stick with Good Habits Every Day
17 How an Accountability Partner Can Change Everything
Advanced Tactics
How to Go from Being Merely Good to Being Truly Great
18 The Truth About Talent (When Genes Matter and When They Don’t)
19 The Goldilocks Rule: How to Stay Motivated in Life and Work
20 The Downside of Creating Good Habits
Conclusion: The Secret to Results That Last
(You may be wondering, “What’s the use of content?” Well, this is the most important part for me because, only after reading the contents, I decide whether to read the book or not. If the content is good, I’ll read the entire book. I also always search Google for content, which is why I’ve pasted it here in case it helps someone.)
Now let’s jump into my personal 5 favorite takeaways.
1st takeaway: Improve every day by just 1%
This advice hit me first in this book, I always do so much in one day because of full of motivation, and the next day I get burnt out, so this lesson is so useful for me.
Improve daily, highlight this word daily, and just improve 1% a day, and keep going.
I started using this lesson to improve myself, to go slowly, and look, I am still using it.
Although it appears to be only 1% per day, it will eventually grow to be massive.
(The author used this example to explain this point better, directly I pasted it from the book:
Imagine that you have an ice cube sitting on the table in front of you. The room
is cold and you can see your breath. It is currently twenty-five degrees. Ever so
slowly, the room begins to heat up.
Twenty-six degrees.
Twenty-seven.
Twenty-eight.
The ice cube is still sitting on the table in front of you.
Twenty-nine degrees.
Thirty.
Thirty-one.
Still, nothing has happened.
Then, thirty-two degrees. The ice begins to melt. A one-degree shift,
seemingly no different from the temperature increases before it, has unlocked a
huge change.)
2nd takeaway from Atomic Habits book: Calendar crossing
I do not know how should I tag this lesson, but yeah you can say calendar crossing.
This is the thing I always avoided doing, and this is a lesson all self-improvement channels suggest in their videos.
But after reading the Atomic Habits book, I started doing it, on this advice, there’s a separate part dedicated.
The advice said that do a green cross mark on everything you have done and do a red cross mark on the things you haven’t done.
This way you are reminding yourself that this is the thing that you should have done, so in your list, all marks should have aligned, so do until your calendar looks the same, which means you should have a green color cross on your day.
This is a visual technique you should practice in your daily life, I know this sounds childish, but please do, this will make you smile at the end of the day.
(Note: In Atomic Habits, there are no colors mentioned, it just said cross, personally, I used color, and it’s going well)
3rd takeaway from Atomic Habits: Focus on systems, not on goals.
First, let’s know what are the goals.
It is the end result you want to achieve, let’s say you want to achieve some awards or want to be top in your class.
This is the goal.
Now let’s know what is a system.
This is the process, this is the journey which you have to go through every day, for example, you have to achieve a football award. Instead of focusing on the award, your focus should be on the system, like how to manage diet, how to manage the team, and how to balance your professional and personal relations.
If you get mastered in focusing on the system, you will get your result without being anxious.
For example, you want to get top in class. Instead of focusing on the result, focus on your daily studies, focus on the daily goals.
(The purpose of setting goals is to win the game. The purpose of building
systems is to continue playing the game.)
This way you will not get stressed about the result because your whole focus should be on the system. And let’s say you will not get your achievable goals, still, you will be at peace that you have tried well.
I am a medical student, and I am trying this method daily, I am living so happily because in the medical field, there are always some exams going on, and there’s daily stress, so I decided to just focus on my studies, and to improve my system because this is the thing only in my control.
(Fix the inputs and the outputs will fix themselves.)
4th takeaway from Atomic Habits book: Change your identity.
This is the habit everyone should build. Changing your identity involves changing your daily habits because good habits change your identity. Maybe some habits give you better results also, but the real benefits of building good habits are, it changes your identity.
The habits you do on a daily basis are a vote for the person you want to become. If you skip the gym, you are voting, you are saying you are not disciplined. Every action matters, whether it is bad or good.
If you want to become the best version of yourself, you need to change your identity, and this will only change if you start changing your daily habits.
5th takeaway from Atomic Habits: You do not want to smoke.
In this, the author explains that nobody wants to smoke; they do it because they want to relieve stress. You do not want to brush your teeth; you do it because of the freshness brushing your teeth gives. So, all habits we do are related to outcomes and the desire it gives.
If you want to change your habits, change your outcome, change your desire.
Ask four questions if you want to change your habits:
- How can I make it obvious?
- How can I make it attractive?
- How can I make it easy?
- How can I make it satisfying?
That’s how you will change your habits.
You can click here if you want to read a chapter summary of this book.
Thank you!
