Form Better Habits (and Make Them Stick) with a Weekly Habit Sprint

And then when reality gets in the way, the plan breaks.

In this process, the team gets better and better each weekit accelerates its output by removing obstacles.

From this, the Habit Sprint was born.

At the end of the week, review: how many days did you do?

What got in the way (obstacles)?

Modify your plan for the next week with solutions to your previous week’s obstacles.

Repeat every week, adjusting your plan to overcome obstacles.

Habit plans are always an ideal, but when we fail, we believe the problem is us.

In actuality, the plan was just not well suited for the reality of your life.

This method overcomes that by making the plan better and better fitted to your reality.

And you’ll get better and better atforming those habits.

Let’s dive into the details.

The Habit Plan

before you roll your habit change, create a simple plan.

Instead, your Habit Plan should include:

What your habit will be specifically.

What your trigger will bethe thing in your day that the habit will come after.

How you’ll rememberset up some reminders.

What your accountability will be.

Will you have a partner or a group, or people you report to daily?

Those are the basics to start with, but your habit plan will evolve with each weekly review.

Your goal should be to do the habit for six or seven days the first week.

What got in the way?

How can you adapt your plan to overcome your obstacles?

Come up with solutions to your obstacles, and add them to your Habit Plan.

Lifehacker has someamazing habit solutions, and I include a few dozen in my new book,Zen Habits.

Do the review even if you missed most or even all the days this week.

Missing days is not the failurethe real failure is not doing the review and learning from your mistakes.

So make the review mandatory.

As long as you do the review, you’ll get better.

Add some accountability and consequences.

Don’t have enough time?

Make the habit smallertwo minutes instead of 15.

Do the habit with a friend or turn it into a game.

Every failure is an opportunity to learn about habit creation, about yourself, and about getting better.

In this way, you’ll get better at habits even with habits that fail.

And soon, you’ll be a habit master.

Leo Babauta is the creator and writer of Zen Habits.