All behavior is rooted in habit.  A countless number of books and gurus do a wonderful job at identifying which habits are harmful and why. But what they don’t concretely do is to teach you how to effectively shed off bad habits and create new exceptional ones.

Lets fix that.

Drawing from dozens of medical, psychological, and business case studies, New York Times reporter Charles Duhigg gives us a basic framework for transforming harmful habits into beneficial ones  in his book The Power of Habit.

Lets jump right into it.

Essentially, this is how a habit is formed;

To make this equation more relatable, lets put these three running components through the context of  timeless a movie that contains a clear cue, routine, and reward; The Wizard of Oz.

Lets also take the example of a simple habit that needs to be changed and run it through this formula. Say our friend… we will call him Thaddeus… has a nasty habit of grabbing a donut every morning when he gets to work. He notices that hes putting on an extra few pounds, and he wants that to stop.

If Thaddeus is like most people, he he will make adamant promises to himself, such as “today will be the last day I go for a donut” and that “tomorrow will be different”. Predictably, he gets to work the next day and the craving is back. In fact, the craving is so strong, that he proceeds to pick up his keys and heads straight to the donut shop. Cue self-loathing and paralyzing feeling of worthlessness.

Now lets hack this nasty little habit using The Wizard of Oz method.

The Tornado
It all starts with that craving for a lovely gooey glazed donut. That craving is the catalyst, the cue… think of it as the tornado that sweeps you off your feet and to which you are hopeless to withstand. Goodbye Kansas.

The Yellow Brick Road
How do you satisfy that craving? This is the action you take to find resolution. For Dorothy it meant following the yellow brick road. For Thaddeus  it means setting off to buy the donut. Following the yellow brick road is the action you take to find resolution, and ultimately becomes the repeated routine that forms a bad habit.

Ruby Slippers
How does it end?  Dorothy gets her ruby slippers, clicks her heels three times, and gets whisked back home. Thaddeus satisfies his craving in the most delicious way possible.

Pretty straightforward, right?

Now that we have a basic operating framework for the anatomy of a habit, we can begin to understand how to fix them.

Step 1. What is your Yellow Brick Road?
Before trying to change your habit, you must first identify the action you are taking to satisfy that craving. Do this by administering the “Yellow Brick Road Test”. What is your yellow brick road? In this case, Thaddeus wants to curtail his habit of going and getting the donut. Can you identify the “Yellow Brick Road” for your destructive habit?

Step 2. Where Will Your Ruby Shoes Take You?
After identifying your yellow brick road, you need to isolate the exact reward at the end of the yellow brick road. For Dorthy, it is Kansas. For Thaddeus, it is biting into that delicious donut. The way to identify the true underlying reward variable is by putting it through the “Ruby Shoes Test”. Critically ask yourself why you are engaging in your bad habit. If you had to click your heels three times right when craving hits, what is the immediate gratification that you want?

Step 3. When Does the Tornado Hit?
Time to run “The Tornado Test”. We’ve already identified the tornado as the destructive craving. When does it hit? Thaddeus gets hit first thing when he gets to work. What specific circumstances in your environment trigger your tornado?

Step 4. Rewrite the Script
You’ve isolated the cue, routine, and reward that make up your habit by putting it through the Wizard of Oz formula. Now its time to play with the variables you’ve identified, and manipulate them to end your habit. Thaddeus knows that his cue to crave hits right when he arrives at work. With this in mind, he now can anticipate his urges and make some changes. He can grab a healthy, filling breakfast in lieu of the donut, or simply go outside and take a 15 minute walk when the craving sets in. In this way, Thaddeus changes a negative habit into a positive one.

Habit hacked.

Relying on sheer will power rarely works. Instead,  approach the process of changing a habit formulaically by breaking down its components and manipulating its variables. Try this method with a harmful habit you are seeking to change, and watch the magic happen.

Happy Habiting!