Features of Habit

It's amazing to me how much of life is directed by habit!

I have a lot of flexibility in my schedule—being self employed—so I am acutely aware of and masochistically guilt-ridden by how unproductive I can be. It goes deeper than that, however. Since moving out of my parents house, I have been my own man. I do what I want when I want. My life is ruled by my desires.

A great example of this is with food. I always eat exactly what seems most desirable to me at that moment. When faced with the perennial question, "Where should we eat lunch?" I quickly take stock of my mood and my options, then choose exactly the dish that will best suit my fancy. (In my mind: a restaurant = my favorite dish there) Missing from this description is any outside will. I might capitulate slightly to a friend who strongly prefers a certain place, but even then, only if I have good reason to think that location will satisfy my momentary urges. But all in all, every culinary experience is preceded by this internal taking-of-stock of the whims of that moment.

I thought this was where it ended. I thought that I was just rather picky and self-centered and that I wanted what I wanted, every time. Recent experiments have modified this perception.

I have recently started a self-directed program I am calling "A Week Without." In this experiment, I choose a certain feature of my life's experience and simply go without it for a week. The purpose of this exercise is to challenge the behavior directed by my desires and hopefully grow as a person. What I have discovered is that there is force behind my desires: habit.

Let's continue the example of eating. Almost without exception, following a meal, I wanted something sweet to finish it off. This is the "dessert" my health-teacher mother never let me have as a child. (Since moving out, I've hardly missed an opportunity.) I didn't think this was that complex. I finished dinner; I want dessert. But after further reflection, I noticed some other patterns behind this. After what was generally a salty dinner, I wanted something sweet. Then after something sweet, I would often want something salty again—to be followed again by the urge for something sweet. (This is a viciously American cycle, I'm afraid.) There was a recurring pattern of post-salty desire for sweet, and post-sweet desire for salty.

Enter: A Week Without. I decided to take a week without sugar. Even more, I wanted a week without anything sweet! This meant no artificial sweetner: no Splenda, no Nutra-Sweet, no polysyntheticsianoacrisugarate. Take it a step further: no natural sugar either. Nothing that tastes sweet. It was one of the hardest weeks of my life!

It was one of the most enlightening weeks of my life! I made it. I did a whole week without anything sweet and I learned several important lessons: First of all, sugar is everywhere! It is really hard to find a weeks worth of food that doesn't include sweet morsels—especially in the bachelor's lifestyle—but it is possible. Second, I learned that some foods are very sweet which I never noticed, like bananas and beer and Saint Louis City water (ok, maybe I was a little delirious).

I also learned that behind my momentary culinary cravings were years of accumulated habits—in particular, this salty/sweet pattern. I had never before stopped to ask myself, "Why do I want that bowl of ice cream?" or "Why do I want that candy bar?" The craving goes back further than just a desire, it goes back to habit. In the last 10 years, I've built the habit of alternating between the two. When I took a week to break the cycle, I found that I didn't want sweet things any more. At the start, I expected to finish my Week Without on the couch with a half-gallon of ice cream, a spoon, and no bowl. The opposite happened. I went more than a week without. Day 8 was sans-sugar. So was day 9. I just didn't want it very badly, and the experiment was more interesting to continue than re-establishing my high-caloric carbohydrate intake.

By Day 10, I started back in with sugar in my coffee (coffee without sugar was really tough!), but not my usual dose of 4-packs-per-six-ounce-cup. I took a single pack-per-cup and it was really sweet! Almost too sweet. Since this experiment, I've gone back to eating sweet foods, but to this day, I don't have but 1/10 the amount of sugar I used to; and I don't miss it. I don't desire it. I don't crave it.

My desires were shaped by the habits I had built, and this week taught me that overcoming those desires was mostly an issue of breaking the habits. I think this is true across the board. Our lives are determined by our habits in great degree! Why is it hard to wake up early? Habit. Why don't I read more? Habit. Why do I waste so much time on the computer? Habit. Why are my social interactions always the same? Habit.

Therefore, I'm continuing my Week Without programs and applying it across the board. I've done a Week Without Music and a Week Without Video. I'm currently in the middle of a Week Without Skipping a Workout (with only moderate success. This may take a few tries.). Each one tells me more about myself and works wonders for growing as a person. And what's behind each of these behaviors that I wish would change is some deep-seated long-standing habit. Want to change a behavior? Challenge the habit.

POSTSCRIPT:  On a side-note, a side effect that I've found from my Weeks Without is that, depending on what I'm going without, it often feels like traveling. When you take a vacation, the whole idea is to get away from your normal routine. A Week Without gets you away from your routine. For example, when I did a Week Without Video, I had all this extra time. It was time I couldn't while away with movies or TV (by self-determined fiat), so I had to find other ways to relax. I read more. I went out more. I called old friends. I explored things around my city that I always wanted to, but never took the time. I went to the Art Museum. I drove through unexplored neighborhoods. I walked around my neighborhood for entertainment. And it all felt new and adventurous, like I was a stranger in this new land.

My! How much we miss when shackled to our own habits!