As a college student, it’s easy to prioritize academics and extracurricular activities over your physical and mental health. You might have found that instead of having habits that are beneficial for your health, your routines mostly involve binging on snack food and studying until your sleep schedule resembles that of a bat. Students typically have more free time during the summer which is why it’s a great time to focus on building healthy habits. These can be activities such as running in the morning, yoga, setting aside time each day to study or journaling before you go to bed. Building healthy habits and practices will help you start next semester on the right foot as the wait to return to an in-person semester finally ends. Read on to learn tips for building habits and maintaining them long term!
Focus on one habit at a time
It’s tempting to get excited and try to build a lot of new skills and practices at the same time. While you may be able to stay on track for a few days or even weeks, it’s likely that you’ll fall off the wagon quickly. When you try to build too many habits at once, it’s difficult to keep track of them and dedicate the necessary time and effort to each of them. For instance, if you’re trying to run every morning but also trying to meal prep, you might find yourself too overwhelmed to do either, especially on days when you wake up a little late. You are more likely to successfully build habits when you focus on one goal at a time. You’ll be less overwhelmed, and it will be easier to keep track of your progress.
Track your progress
I found that habit tracking is extremely useful as it’s motivating to see the progress I’ve made and how much more progress I need to make to attain a particular goal. When you have a streak going, it’s that much more incentive to ignore the urge to have a cheat day. Plus, looking back on your progress is incredibly rewarding. An easy way to track your progress with your goal is to measure your streak: the number of consecutive days (or weeks, or months or years) you stuck to the habit. You can either use online habit trackers or create one yourself in an online or physical journal. Some online trackers you can use include Habitify, Habitica and Strides.
Focus on making regular, marginal improvements
Rather than aiming for quantum leaps, it’s easier to maintain healthy habits in the long term if you focus on making small but regular improvements. Small changes compound over time to yield large returns. For instance, say your …….
Source: https://www.dailycal.org/2021/06/08/tips-for-building-healthy-habits/
