The Secret to Lasting Habit Change

By Kelle Walsh

Even with the best of intentions (eat a cornucopia of antioxidant foods, hit the weight room, and get to bed by 10pm), if you don't turn ideas into habits, and reinforce them again and again, they likely won’t stick.

There’s a reason why only about 9% of people keep their New Year’s resolutions through the end of January: Changing behavior is hard.

That’s because you’re up against the brain’s instinct to covet well-established neural pathways called habit feedback loops. The longer a loop runs unchallenged, the more ingrained the behavior becomes—and the more difficult it is to change. This is called “automaticity” and it is defined by efficiency, lack of awareness, unintentionally, and uncontrollability.

For example, your brain knows that wine with dinner signals a relaxing evening ahead (reward). Come 6pm (trigger), as you scan the pantry wondering what to make, you go to pour a glass of Malbec without thinking twice (behavior).

Trigger — Behavior — Reward. Works every time.

The brain doesn’t have the same relationship with new behaviors. Trying to fit them into its well-programed system requires extra energy and effort.

Meanwhile, we know that adopting healthy behaviors can extend our lives.

In one analysis, scientists found that women and men in their 50s who adopted five habits of longevity — healthy eating, not smoking, getting at least 3.5 hours of moderately vigorous exercise each week, drinking only moderate amounts of alcohol, and maintaining a healthy body weight — lived more than a decade longer than people who didn’t make those changes.

The women increased their expected lifespan from age 79 to 93, while the men increased theirs from 75.5 to 87.6.

So, creating new healthy habits is key for living longer. And yet the brain is hardwired to keep traveling the same ol’ habit feedback loops it knows. What do we do?

Keep Steady to Build Healthy Habits

Researchers tell us that the average amount of time it takes to develop a habit is 66 days, though it can take as long as 254 days (and as few as 18).

Keeping at it is key. The same study found that automaticity increases steadily as a behavior is repeated. Importantly, it also found that motivation doesn’t predict success—only consistency does. (Cue dashed resolutions worldwide.)

Another study found that developing an exercise habit requires at least four sessions a week for six weeks.

The takeaway? If you want to adopt a new behavior, you need to do it again, again, and again until it becomes automatic. And it might take longer than you think.

Start Small and Build

Remember when you decided to master French in 6 months, and ordered all those books on Amazon and signed up for Duolingo and Babbel?

When we get fired up about making a lifestyle change, we tend to go all in — at first. But research shows that making drastic changes in behavior and hoping they take, rarely works.

Instead, starting with small changes that feel doable, and building toward your desired outcome, is a more sustainable path.

For example, completely changing your diet is a lot more difficult than adding a new healthy food each week, like trying a new vegetable or making steel-cut oats instead of instant.

Also, adopting new habits is often easier if we pair them with existing routines. Habit stacking, also called piggybacking, builds on an already automatic behavior, and then adds a bit more. By linking the two behaviors, the trigger is already in place, and the brain requires less energy and effort to adopt the new activity.

For example, drinking a glass of water after brushing your teeth each morning is an easier habit to build than trying to remember to drink more water during the day.

Pairing your desired habit with a visual cue is also helpful, like keeping a water glass by your toothbrush.

Track Your Journey

It’s easy to lose sight of our goals as we go about our days and weeks. Even great intentions can fizzle without support. Using a tracking app may help.

Research finds people who use digital tracking methods to lose weight are more engaged, and that the closer people track their efforts, the more weight they lose.

And digital apps have been found successful in helping sedentary people increase physical activity and physical functioning, and reduce sedentary time.

By tracking your progress, you bring awareness to your experience and your behavior. Both can help remind you of your larger goal, and encourage choice.

Celebrate Progress

Behavior change is a marathon, not a sprint. Without support along the way, it’s easy to get discouraged and give up. By celebrating even incremental accomplishments, you build confidence in your ability to change, and motivation to keep going.

Longevity Tip: Use Morning Energy to Power Your Habits

Your morning routine sets the stage for long-term habit change. Researchers found that morning habits are significantly more likely to stick than evening ones.

Why? Heightened cortisol levels makes us more alert, supporting habit formation. Plus, mornings have fewer interruptions, creating a reliable space for new practices.

Try this: Stack longevity-building healthy habits with already-established morning routines:

• When you wake up, do a 5-minute gratitude meditation before getting in the shower

• Add antioxidant fruits like avocado to your breakfast smoothie, scramble, or whole-grain toast

• Wear a weighted vest for your morning dog walk