José first told me about The Power of Habit and it caught my interest.
My review of The Power of Habit
I found the book educative and entertaining. It’s full of great stories that the author, Charles Duhigg, uses to make his points. He also prescribes how one can change a bad habit.
Habits, according to him, are formed by a cycle. A cue triggers behavior (good or bad), then a reward, and then a craving develops to drive a loop of repetitive behavior.
The “Power of Habit” is one of the best non-fiction books I’ve read in long time. It gives you a whole new and life-changing perspective.
Book Description
A young woman walks into a laboratory. Over the past two years, she has transformed almost every aspect of her life. She has quit smoking, run a marathon, and been promoted at work. The patterns inside her brain, neurologists discover, have fundamentally changed.
Marketers at Procter & Gamble study videos of people making their beds. They are desperately trying to figure out how to sell a new product called Febreze, on track to be one of the biggest flops in company history. Suddenly, one of them detects a nearly imperceptible pattern—and with a slight shift in advertising, Febreze goes on to earn a billion dollars a year.
An untested CEO takes over one of the largest companies in America. His first order of business is attacking a single pattern among his employees—how they approach worker safety—and soon the firm, Alcoa, becomes the top performer in the Dow Jones.
What do all these people have in common? They achieved success by focusing on the patterns that shape every aspect of our lives.
They succeeded by transforming habits.
In The Power of Habit, award-winning New York Times business reporter Charles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. With penetrating intelligence and an ability to distill vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives, Duhigg brings to life a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential for transformation.
Along the way we learn why some people and companies struggle to change, despite years of trying, while others seem to remake themselves overnight. We visit laboratories where neuroscientists explore how habits work and where, exactly, they reside in our brains. We discover how the right habits were crucial to the success of Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz, and civil-rights hero Martin Luther King, Jr. We go inside Procter & Gamble, Target superstores, Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church, NFL locker rooms, and the nation’s largest hospitals and see how implementing so-called keystone habits can earn billions and mean the difference between failure and success, life and death.
At its core, The Power of Habit contains an exhilarating argument: The key to exercising regularly, losing weight, raising exceptional children, becoming more productive, building revolutionary companies and social movements, and achieving success is understanding how habits work.
“As people strengthened their willpower muscles in one part of their lives—in the gym, or a money management program—that strength spilled over into what they ate or how hard they worked. Once willpower became stronger, it touched everything.”
― Charles Duhigg, The Power Of Habit: Why We Do What We Do In Life And Business
Habits aren’t destiny. As Charles Duhigg shows, by harnessing this new science, we can transform our businesses, our communities, and our lives.
Our habits can make or break us, right? And it takes about a month, or so, to develop a habit, make it stick. There are some habits I have worked on and some I struggle to make stick. We look for rewards and when we don’t get any, we slip off the track. I guess that’s what is happening with me.
I borrowed this book from our library’s ebooks collection but didn’t get time to read. Habits definitely mound us into better, strong willed people.
I have seen the app blinkist before and heard good reviews about it. I think for reading non fictions blinkist would be a good help.
Mold not mound. Sorry for the typo!
Vinitha recently posted..Introducing #FictionMonday
Entering the new year of my life, I decided to work on habit building. I have taken a few steps and 10 days later, I am still going for it with an intention to carry it on. Atomic Habits is on my TBR and my planned 3rd read (from now) in my current list. It appears like the universe is listening and hence brought this book ‘The Power of Habit’ to my knowledge. It will be my 4th read. Blinkist is new to me and I am going to explore its free plan for the time being.
Anamika Agnihotri recently posted..The days of holding hands #WordlessWednesday
I have read a summary about the book before, however, after reading your post i am considering reading the book for real. I would love to read the examples and understand what was that 1 thing that tipped things in that persons/companies favour – interesting stuff!
This looks like an interesting book. My father always used to say that a man is a slave of his habits. I would try the audio book. These days I am trying audio books, especially for my son audio books are a god sent as for him reading is difficult.
I feel like this is something I really need right now. I have been trying to change some of my habits for long but without any success. The stories have made me curious. Will check it out on amazon.
Rajlakshmi recently posted..Chosen | Haibun
This is absolutely true Corinne about habit transforming lives. It seems to be such an amazing book on small steps taken and armed with self belief till we get attuned to it. Thanks for sharing and hinting at examples about businesses thriving.