Habit stacking is a behavior change technique that can be leveraged to form new healthy habits in life. This technique involves "stacking" a new behavior onto a pre-existing task, activity, or habit that's already well established in your life.
For example, you could "stack" 5 minutes of daily journaling into your normal morning routine by dedicating 5 minutes to journaling right after you shower in the morning. Associating a new behavior with a pre-existing behavior helps to streamline the process of forming new habits. The new habit is more easily adopted as it becomes an automated part of your normal routine.
Tips for implementing habit stacking:
1. Identify an anchor behavior - be sure to select a well-established behavior that is already part of your normal, daily routine to anchor in the new behavior.
2. Start small - start with one simple behavior so that it can be added into your routine without getting overwhelmed - you can always build in more complexity once you've gotten into a good routine.
3. Use a visual reminder - this could be as simple as laying a book on top of your pillow after you make your bed in the morning as a visual cue to remind you to spend 10 minutes reading before you go to bed each night.
For more info on habit stacking:
a) Habit Stacking: 127 Small Changes to Improve Your Health, Wealth, and Happiness by S.J. Scott: https://amzn.to/4aXAILJ
b) Neuroscience of Habits: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/striving-thriving/202110/the-neuroscience-habits