Atomic Habits Book Review on The Sales Podcast

An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones

Sales Tips you’ll learn today on The Sales Podcast

  • In the same way we get a lot of power from splitting tiny atoms in the form of nuclear energy, you can unleash great power in your life with tiny changes

  • Your habits shape your identity

  • The four steps to building better habits

    • Make it obvious

    • Make it attractive

    • Make it easy

    • Make it satisfying

12_week_year_review

…the aggregation of marginal gains.” ~Dave Brailsford, Performance Director of the British Cycling team

  • Massive success does not always require massive action

  • Over time, a tiny improvement can make a huge difference

  • Habit improvements compound like money compounds with interest

  • Be patient

  • Be disciplined

  • Don’t slide back into your old routines and habits

  • On a flight from L.A. to NYC, if the plane is 3.5 degrees off course, it will miss NYC by 225 miles and land in D.C.

  • Success is the product of daily habits

  • Be more concerned with your trajectory than your results

  • Your outcomes are lagging indicators of your efforts, your habits

  • You get what you repeat

  • Good habits make time your ally

  • Positive and negative compounding habits

    • Productivity vs. stress

    • Knowledge vs. negative thinking

    • Relationships vs. rage

  • Breakthrough moments come after long, focused periods of invisible work

    • Bamboo

    • Cancer

    • Business wins

  • The Plateau of Latent Potential

    • Change can take years…before it happens all at once

    • Mastery requires patience

    • People call you an overnight success

    • The Valley of Disappointment

    • The results of our efforts are often delayed

  • All big things come from small beginnings

  • Breaking a bad habit is like uprooting a powerful oak tree

  • Building a good habit is like nurturing a delicate rose one day at a time

  • Forget about goals, focus on systems

  • Goals define the results you want, systems are the steps you take to get those results

  • The only way to win is to get better every day

  • Bill Walsh, Super Bowl-winning coach of the 49s said, “The score takes care of itself.”

  • Goals are good for setting direction, systems are best for making progress

  • Winners and losers have the same goals

  • Goal setting suffers from survivorship bias

  • Achieving a goal is only a momentary change

  • You must address the cause, not just the symptom

  • You need better systems

  • With the proper input, the output will take care of itself

  • Goals restrict your happiness

  • Goals create an “either-or” conflict

  • A systems-first mentality is the antidote

  • Goals are at odds with long-term progress

  • It’s a yo-yo effect

  • We want to do more than win the game. Systems help us to continue playing the game.

  • You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems

  • Focus on 1% improvement

  • Make small, easy-to-implement changes

  • Why is it so easy to repeat bad habits and so hard to form good ones?

    • We try to change the wrong thing

    • We try to change in the wrong way

  • Three layers of behavior change

    • Outcome (Get)

    • Processes (Do)

    • Identity (Believe)

  • Most of the time, we work from the outside in

  • We need to work from the inside out, i.e., from the identity to the process to the outcome

  • Shift the focus from what you want to achieve to who you want to become

    • “Want a cigarette?” “No, I’m trying to quit.”

    • “Want a cigarette?” “No, I’m not a smoker.”

  • Behavior that is incongruent with the self will not last

  • The ultimate form of intrinsic motivation is when a habit becomes part of your identity

  • Take pride in yourself, and you’ll be motivated to maintain the habits

  • True behavior change is identity change

  • Improvements are only temporary until they become part of who you are

    • Become a reader

    • Become a runner

    • Become a musician

  • Get out of your cognitive slumber

    • “I’m terrible with directions.”

    • “I’m not a morning person.”

    • “I’m horrible at remembering names.”

    • You create your own reality of negativity

  • Identity conflict is your main barrier to positive change

  • You are self-sabotaging because of your negative identity

  • Progress requires unlearning

  • So how do you form your identity?

  • Your beliefs are learned and then conditioned through experience

  • In other words, your habits embody your identity

  • The word identity is derived from the Latin words essential, which means being, and identidem, which means repeatedly

  • So your identity is literally your “repeated beingness.”

  • The more evidence you have for a belief, i.e., “I’m terrible with names,” the more strongly you will believe it.

  • The process of building habits is the process of becoming yourself

  • Fortunately, meaningful change does not require radical change

  • If a change is meaningful, it is big!

  • To change who you are, change what you do.

  • Trust yourself. Learn to trust yourself by doing small habits repeatedly that bring about the small results you’re seeking

  • You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t need a unanimous vote to become a new you.

  • Just give yourself new evidence of your new self to create your new identity

  • Who do you want to be?

  • What do you want to stand for?

  • What are your principles and values?

  • Who do you wish to become?

  • Maybe you have some big goals. Write those down, then work backward to figure out what you need to do to get there.

  • “I want to write a book (outcome-based). Who is the type of person who writes books? Someone who is consistent, disciplined, and reliable. Okay. I am a consistent, reliable, disciplined person (identity-based).”

  • This is a feedback loop. It’s a two-way street

  • Focus on becoming the right type of person you need to be, and the outcome will take care of itself

  • Know who you want to be. Habits help you become that someone.

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