A Back Story

It was just after winter break last December when I picked up “The Power of Habit” by Charles Duhigg, off the GOALS bookshelf. Amidst the hustle and bustle of activity in the recreation room of Ena Hostel, IIT Bhilai, lies a piece of furniture whose glass sliding door is almost impossible to be labelled transparent thanks to the layer of dust gathered over it. We had just come out of quarantine, which was mandatory for students returning to campus in December. Shukla, a friendly face among many at IIT Bhilai, was the Secretary of GOALS (the college’s General Oratory and Literary Society). He asked me, in his bid to promote readership among a batch of students who predominantly had their college online so far, to pick a book.

Several titles stood out. Notably ‘Mein Kampf’, ‘A brief history of time’, ‘To kill a Monckingbird’ and ‘The Godfather’ have been on my to-read list for as far as I can remember. With its sleek white cover, “The Power of Habit” stood out even though I had never heard of the book before. Could be because I was looking to mend my procrastination and ✌️cure✌️ my laziness… God knows I’ve failed and am the same, if not worse. However, I secretly believe it was my disgust of the hours I would spend devouring Netflix shows that got me to pick it up.

Since then, it’s been a bumpy ride. Ironically, I tried making a habit of reading the book regularly and failed. I may cite that I am used to reading novels filled with fiction that stirs my imagination. But this is simply incorrect. The book was a habit I tried to force upon myself and this never works.

So I got back to it a week into my summer break. In between, I devoured “Mossad: The Greatest Missions of The Israeli Secret Service”, a birthday gift, on my way home. That was easy as it was a book of thrilling but non-fictional tales. Once I started with my book on Habits, I didn’t try to force myself to read it. Instead I warded of temptations to pick up other titles. It has taken some more time than usual but I have finished 70% of the book and have learnt more from this than any fictional masterpiece I’ve picked up.

This calls for a blog. A place where I can discuss what I have read, while attempting to give analogies to anecdotes in my life. A place where I can think of the things I’m doing wrong and try to make them right. A place to keep track of my growth from a self-help book.

The Book

The book has been presented with utmost care in three parts. The systematic presentation of case studies and analyses warrants a fair bit of praise from any reader.

Prologue

Here, the author describes the transformation of Lisa Allen, from a 16-year-old obese, chainsmoking teenager with thousands of dollars in debt already to a lean and vibrant 34-year-old woman in the same job for just more than 3 years. How, the author poses a question, does such a transformation occur? How are some able to make this change while others struggle to and a few select others never have to? Lisa Allen believes that a switch in her mind tripped when she made some insane promises to herself on her return trip from Egypt. The author believes it is much more than this. The author was inspired to study the science of habits when it dawned on him, during his time as a newspaper reporter in Baghdad, that the US-Military is the biggest habit-formation exercises in history.¹

I). The Habits of Individuals

• The Habit Loop

  How habits work?

  • Eugene Pauly’s viral encephalitis and how habit helped him find his way home…
  • Henry Molaison’s bike accident and why he was always introducing himself to people who already knew him…
  • MIT Scientists’ study of the basal ganglia and formulation of the cue-routine-reward cycle…
    
    

• The Craving Brain

  How to create new habits?

  • Claude Hopkins, Pepsodent and Why is there foam in our toothpaste?
  • How the team at Procter & Gamble first failed before making Febreze a must-have in millions of American homes
  • The State University of New Mexico study of cravings and exercise habits
    
    

• The Golden Rule of Habit Change

  Why transformation occurs?

  • Tony Dungy coaching philosophy, his misfortune with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and bittersweet time with the Indianapolis Colts…
  • Bill Wilson and Alcoholics Anonymous path to becoming the largest, most well-known habit-changing organization in the world until the cracks in their walls were exposed…
  • Mandy, the 24-year-old graduate student from Mississippi with a nail-biting problem…
    
    

II). The Habits of Successful Organizations

• Keystone Habits Or The Ballad of Paul O’Neill

  Which habits matter most?

  • Paul O’Neill and worker safety in Alcoa…
  • Michael Phelps and Bob Bowman’s video tape…
  • How small wins propelled the LGBTQ Equal Rights movement in the right direction…
    
    

• Starbucks and The Habit of Success

  When willpower becomes automatic…

  • Travis Leach and his Starbuck’s career
  • Case Western Reserve University, hungry students and delicious cookies, 4-year-olds and marshmallows, and Mark Muraven’s study of willpower…
  • Oaten, Cheng and the Tasmanian’s social experiments to study willpower…
  • A British Psychologist’s Scottish study to explain how to boost the willpower of people exceptionally resistant to change…
  • Howard Schulz and Starbucks’ LATTE for employees…
    
    

• The Power of a Crisis

  How leaders create habits through accident and design…

  • Rhode Island Hospital’s unsettling peace between Physicians and Nurses…
  • A couple of Yale professors, routines, and “An Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change”
  • Horror in London’s Underground and how it’s similar to Rhode Island’s work environment
    
    

• How Target Knows What You Want Before You Do?

  When companies predict (and manipulate) habits…

  • Andrew Pole and Target’s quest to find pregnant customers…
  • Shopping habits and Visiting Prof. Alan Andreasen’s paper on “Why do some people suddenly change their shopping routines?”
  • Rich Meyer, Chicago, 1985, The study of hit records, and how to make records hits…
  • Meat on American dining tables during World War II…
  • YMCAs cracking of the code to keep people in the gym…
    
    

III). The Habits of Societies

• Saddleback Church and The Montgomery Bus Boycott

  How movements happen?
  
  

• The Neurology of Free Will

  Are we responsible for our habits?
  
  
  

What am I doing writing this?

The book is a collection of a little over 30 tales. That’s it. The author stitches together these stories, hoping to provide a framework for someone to make a habit. The only way to test this is to think about what is presented and try them out in my day-to-day. This blog series shall consist of my day-to-day thought experiments and yet another representation of what is discussed in the book.

As of this evening, I am unsure how many blog-posts should cover the book. My estimate rests at 4-5 blog posts.

Also to be noted:

A list of stories described in the last 2 chapters is not yet given as I am yet to peruse those chapters.

Cheers!
Thank You for reading!

Sources