how to break a bad habit essay

Essays About Bad Habits: 5 Essays Examples and Writing Prompts

Writing about bad habits poses an interesting topic; to help with your essays about bad habits, read our top essay examples and writing prompts below.

Many people tend to discount their bad habits as small. They get blinded to their life-shattering and long-term effects because they don’t think of it as a “big deal,” they get blinded to their life-shattering and long-term effects. 

Whether smoking or procrastination, these habits are detrimental to our quality of life. Many people don’t realize how detrimental these habits can be until they create more significant problems in their lives.

Writing about bad habits and how to kick them will create an engaging, compelling, and thought-provoking essay. Read on to see the best examples of essays about bad habits and 8 intriguing writing prompts.

1. Weekly Reflections – The Ordeal of Breaking Bad Habits by Steven Lawson

2. how to break a bad habit and replace it with a good one by james clear, 3. how bad habits form (and why they’re so difficult to break) by ian kan, 4. break your bad habits by amy novotney, 5. 5 bad business habits you need to stop immediately by dylan ogline, 8 prompts on writing essays about bad habits, 1. causes of bad habits, 2. how bad habits take a toll on the health, 3. getting past the challenge of changing bad habits, 4. how to know if a habit is bad or good, 5. does stress drive us to form bad habits, 6. are bad habits contagious learn how to avoid adopting them, 7. american habits that are considered weird or bad habits in other cultures, 8. understanding the time it takes to break a bad habit.

“Our external realities are always tied to and flow out of our interior/spiritual core. Change occurs first at one’s core and then manifests itself on the surface, not the other way around.”  

Lawson uses a spiritual approach to understand bad habits, including how they’re formed and how to get rid of them. He delved into his difficulties with transforming his bad habits and wrote about how he perceived his bad habits as a behavioral reaction to a problem.

“You can teach yourself new and healthy ways to deal with stress and boredom, which you can then substitute in place of your bad habits.”

Clear’s take on bad habits is that they are methods of dealing with stress and boredom. After explaining the formation of habits from stress and boredom, he provides methods and tips for replacing them with good habits. Clear also included examples that his readers can easily relate to.

“Of course, you might feel guilty, but the goal is to be aware of those bad habits and how often they happen. Then from there, you can hatch a plan to break those habits.”

Ian Kan’s essay on bad habits dives into the psychology behind habit formation, including the various stages. After this in-depth look, he offers various methods of transforming bad habits into good ones.

“Self-motivation is best sustained by having a clear, long-range goal that can be broken down into a series of specific, attainable smaller goals to guide one’s efforts along the way.”

Novotney’s essay focuses on the top ten habits that grad students have that prevent them from gaining further academic success. She emphasizes how these habits keep students from making it through graduate school. On top of listing a good number of commonly practiced bad habits among students, she also included solutions for fixing and correcting them.

“But with each habit I shed, my prospects got brighter. When I shed all five, my agency was on track to becoming the seven-figure business it is today.”

Ogline takes bits and pieces from his experience as a business owner to write his essay on bad habits. He also provides business smarts and wisdom for readers of his essay, whether they’re simply interested in the essay or fellow entrepreneurs.

Consider the essay ideas and topics we’ve listed below if you’re more interested in writing your essays about bad habits.

Understand why bad habits exist or how they form by reading and writing about them. Use this essay writing opportunity to talk about how certain actions, situations, or emotions may lead to the formation of some bad habits.

Like stress, bad habits can worsen a person’s health. This essay focuses on the harm bad habits may cause to a person’s physical or mental health. You can even include how bad habits caused by stress can stress a person even more.

This idea will drive you to consider how difficult it is to get out of a habit cycle. When you choose to write about this topic, ensure you research the different methods of effectively dropping bad habits for different kinds of people. It gives immense help if you’ve already experienced how hard it is to break a bad habit. 

Figure out how to write a narrative essay to better share your story.

Sometimes, a habit lies in the gray area. It can be good in certain situations and bad at other times. Thus, it’s helpful to figure out how detrimental or beneficial a habit is. Consider including a habit’s effects in the short and long term.

Bad habits can form from many things, including stress. This essay prompt encourages you to read about how stress can create bad habits in a person. For example, drinking alcohol can become a way for someone to cope with stress from work or family pressure. Then, consider other forms of bad habits and how stress might have a hand in encouraging their formation.

Like diseases, bad habits can spread from person to person. In extreme cases, bad habits can even affect entire nations. Think about the bad habits you’ve gotten from being around or observing other people. You can also apply this essay to fictional works wherein the characters start adopting each other’s bad habits. It provides a good study on how bad habits can

What you may see as a bad habit can be good in a different culture. A famous example is slurping noodles loudly in East Asian countries. Loud slurping is unpleasant and rude in the West, but it’s a sign of appreciation for the food in East Asia. Research other habits that create cultural divides and discuss the different ways people view them, whether negatively or positively.

Let’s say you’re ready to break a bad habit. The challenge is to endure until you’ve gotten rid of it or changed it into a good one. This essay idea is a perfect topic for people who have tried breaking several bad habits and want to write about the experience. Use this essay topic to explore why some bad habits took longer to stop and how difficult it has been to break them.  

Get more writing ideas from our informative essay topics list for students.   

Maria Caballero is a freelance writer who has been writing since high school. She believes that to be a writer doesn't only refer to excellent syntax and semantics but also knowing how to weave words together to communicate to any reader effectively.

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How to Break Up with Your Bad Habits

Why is breaking a habit so difficult? Because habits are made up of three components: a trigger (for example, feeling stressed), a behavior (browsing the Internet), and a reward (feeling sated). Each time we reinforce the reward, we become more likely to repeat the behavior. This is why old habits are so hard to break — it takes more than self-control to change them. But after 20 years of studying the behavioral neuroscience of how habits form, and the best way to tackle them, researchers have found a surprisingly natural solution: using mindfulness training to make people more aware of the “reward” reinforcing their behavior. Doing so helps people tap into what is driving their habit in the first place. Once this happens, they are more easily able to change their association with the “reward” from a positive one to a more accurate (and often negative) one.

Breaking habits is hard. We all know this, whether we’ve failed our latest diet (again), or felt the pull to refresh our Instagram feed instead of making progress on a work project that is past due. This is largely because we are constantly barraged by stimuli engineered to make us crave and consume , stimuli that hijack the reward-based learning system  in our brains designed initially for survival.

• JB Jud Brewer MD PhD is an addiction psychiatrist and neuroscientist specializing in anxiety and habit change. He is an associate professor at Brown University’s School of Public Health and Medical School and the author of The Craving Mind: From Cigarettes to Smartphones to Love — Why We Get Hooked and How We Can Break Bad Habits .  Dr. Brewer has posted 20+ short videos on how to develop resilience and work with Coronavirus-related mental health issues on his YouTube Channel .    

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Habit Formation

Breaking bad: how to break up with your bad habits, understand triggers that drive bad habits and break free of the habit loop..

Posted April 23, 2024 | Reviewed by Ray Parker

• Our habits can profoundly impact our lives.
• We automatically engage in our habits, good and bad, with little thought as to how they impact our lives.
• Breaking bad habits means understanding your habit loops and identifying situations that cue behaviors.

We are creatures of habits, both good and bad. What separates the good from the bad are the negative consequences that result from the bad ones, ranging from mildly embarrassing—say, nail-biting when nervous—to problematic, like scrolling social media sites into the wee hours. This can lead to loss of sleep and exhaustion among other potentially life-altering consequences such as substance use and risk-taking behaviors. Our habits can leave us that leave us stuck, sick, struggling, and alone.

What Makes Habits So Hard to Break

In her 2019 article , "Creatures of Habit: The Neuroscience of Habit and Purposeful Behavior," neuropsychiatrist Alana Mendelsohn explains that our habits “serve a critical purpose in making our behavior more efficient, reducing the decision burden we face each day and freeing up mental energy for more demanding tasks.”

Habits are, by definition, automatic behaviors. What makes our habits so hard to break is that we engage in them, for the most part, with little or no thought. Rarely do we stop to examine, challenge, or reflect on how problematic habits may be impacting our lives.

Cue, Routine, Reward: The Habit Loop

In his 2016 New York Times article , "How to Form Healthy Habits in Your 20s," Charles Duhigg, author of The Power of Habit, describes the neurological habit loop as a three-part process consisting of "a cue, a routine, and a reward.” Our automatic routines or habits kick in as the result of a cue. We carry out a habit or routine without much thought, and our actions result in a reward.

Say, for example, you are unhappy in your job and look forward to your weekends as a time to relax, unwind, and press pause on the major stressors in your life. As the weekend winds down and Sunday night rolls around, you find yourself falling into a negative habit of self-soothing by overindulging in comfort foods, drinking too much, or spending time and money online shopping. Any of these behaviors or habits might deliver part three of the habit loop: the reward, or distracting you from the anticipatory anxiety of the looming workweek and a return to dreaded daily routine settings.

Breaking the Habit Loop

Here’s the good news: When it comes to our bad habits, breaking up is hard—but not impossible—to do. In a 2019 post, Judson Brewer describes a powerful three-part mindfulness -based approach to breaking bad habits. This approach involves examining the quality of the reward and determining whether this reward delivers harmful consequences, paying attention to the actual behaviors related to a habit, and replacing a negative behavior and reward with a more positive, healthy one.

Self-Awareness and Self-Compassion

As we strive to manage or eliminate bad habits, we need to remain both present in the moment and compassionate with ourselves. We need to allow ourselves time and patience as we work to eliminate entrenched habits and patterns. We need to banish an all-or-nothing mindset that can derail months of progress when we slip up and veer off track. We need to stay connected to our feelings and have compassion for ourselves when we feel vulnerable or at risk of falling back into old habits. And we need to seek support from friends, family members, and mental health professionals when we are struggling.

6 Powerful Strategies to Help Break Bad Habits

1. Build awareness around what you want to change. Awareness is always the first step to making meaningful change. Admitting to yourself that you repeatedly overwork, turn to alcohol or drugs, or distract yourself with online shopping, comfort foods, or binge-watching TV to numb or avoid uncomfortable feelings, situations, or settings sets the stage for deciding to do better for yourself.

2. Decide to change. Make a promise to yourself to eliminate a habit or pattern of behavior with negative consequences. Remember, a bad habit typically involves negative consequences. These are consequences that negatively impact your life in some way.

3. Get to know what triggers the habit you wish to eliminate. Identify the situations and settings that cue behaviors and provide the reward—such as numbing uncomfortable feelings—that you wish to eliminate from your life.

4. Address your triggers and cues. If you need help managing overwhelming trauma , low mood, anxiety, or stress , seek the help of a professional.

5. Bring in compassion for yourself as you strive to make changes and seek help and support when you need it. Give yourself time to break entrenched habits and patterns.

6. Replace habits and patterns that no longer serve you with positive, enjoyable, and healthy interests and pursuits.

Monica Vermani, C. Psych., is a clinical psychologist specializing in the treatment of trauma, stress, mood and anxiety disorders, and the author of A Deeper Wellness .

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How To Break A Bad Habit: A Research-Based Psychological Approach

Humans tend to be creatures of habit, relying on patterns, routines, and rituals to help us meet our needs without having to expend too much cognitive effort. While many habits can be beneficial for navigating daily life, bad habits can have the opposite effect, interfering with our ability to achieve our goals, maintain good health, or spend time meaningfully. 

Whether good or bad, however, habits are usually deeply ingrained in the brain, and breaking them often involves a period of “unlearning” the old habit and learning a new one in its place. Understanding the habit loop, implementing a reward system, and tracking your progress can be helpful. Online or in-person therapy can provide professional support in eliminating bad habits and developing healthier ones.

Understanding bad habits

Habits can be defined as behaviors we engage in with little to no conscious thought or effort. Bad habits tend to be those that negatively affect us in some way, such as wasting our time, damaging our health, or impacting our relationships. 

If you struggle with a bad habit, you may have already tried to break it, only to find yourself engaging in the same behavior again. This cycle can be frustrating and make it seem as if your own brain is acting against your best interests. In cases where the bad habit has evolved into a compulsion or addiction, it can even seem as though you lack free will. 

One irksome feature of habits can be that we often do not notice that we are engaging in them moment-by-moment. In fact, research has found that nearly half of our actions may be automatic, which can explain why breaking bad habits can be so challenging. In the same way you might not remember making the conscious choice to brush your teeth this morning, you probably do not actively choose to check your phone throughout the day.

Why bad habits can be hard to break: Understanding the neuroscience of habits

To understand why breaking bad habits can be so tricky, it might help to learn about what’s happening in your brain when you engage in them. By the time a behavior has become a habit, it has usually been encoded deep within the basal ganglia , a group of brain structures responsible for habits and rituals. As a result, you may engage in the behavior without significant cognitive effort.

Habits typically form due to the brain’s reward system. When you engage in a pleasurable or worthwhile activity, pleasure hormones like dopamine are usually released, signaling to the brain that that behavior is “good.” With repeated exposure, the brain may become conditioned to seek out and repeat those behaviors. 

However, the resulting reward may not necessarily align with your goals, values, or desires. For example, the small pleasure of seeing positive reactions to a social media post may be enough to trigger this dopamine response, even if you might ultimately derive more satisfaction from spending your time in a more fulfilling or productive way. 

Digital habits, in particular, tend to be especially hard to break. Tech companies often strive to create a frictionless, reward-rich user experience , and with modern life demanding seemingly constant digital interactions, these pleasurable experiences are often accessible through a simple tap or click.

How to form new habits: Strategies for rewiring your brain

While bad habits can be frustrating, it may be relieving to know that they can be broken. It can take time, however. While updated evidence may be necessary, one study found that it usually took between 18 and 254 days for participants to form an eating, drinking, or activity behavior. With mindfulness, effort, and patience, you may find that replacing negative habits with positive ones becomes increasingly feasible. 

1. Understand the habit loop

You could begin by understanding the habit loop, which generally states that the cue triggers the habit, which results in a reward. Reflect on each component of your habit. Are there certain situations where you tend to be more vulnerable to engaging in your bad habit? Is your habit made easier by something in your environment? What is the reward that reinforces your bad habit?

Once you’ve become aware of these cues and rewards, you may be better equipped to make the necessary adjustments to your routine.

2. Check in with your values

Next, reflect on your values, goals, and desires. If your habit doesn’t align with the version of yourself you envision, consider what steps you could take to bridge the gap between your current behaviors and those that reflect your ideal self. 

In James Clear’s bestselling book Atomic Habits, he suggests taking a “fake it ‘til you make it” approach to habit change. You might start by adopting small, manageable behaviors that align with the kind of person you want to be, and with time, you may become that person.

3. Learn a new habit

Though it can be common to use words like “quitting” to describe the process of breaking a bad habit, it might be more helpful to think of it as learning a new one. For example, someone who wants to stop scrolling on their phone in the morning might choose to read a book instead.  

It can also help to attach your new habits to current habits, a practice Clear refers to as “habit stacking.” This might help you automate the habit more quickly, as it generally entails turning existing parts of your routine into “cues,” thus triggering a positive habit loop.

4. Implement a reward system

A reward system may be another factor worth considering, particularly as you actively work to break your bad habit. You could incorporate rewards for maintaining new habits or reaching milestones, for example. 

It can also help to become mindful of the intrinsic rewards associated with your new habits. The person who wants to avoid their phone in the morning might, for instance, bring awareness to the sense of calm and mental clarity they feel, or notice all that there is to appreciate about starting the day with a book.

5. Look for ways to eliminate cues

When you first take inventory of the “habit loop” that drives your undesirable behavior, you may notice some of the cues that lead up to it. It can be helpful to find ways to minimize or eliminate these stimuli. For the chronic phone user, that might mean eliminating the visual cue by charging the phone in another room overnight.

If your cue is situational, you might look for ways to alter your routine. For example, someone who notices that their sweet tooth kicks in while watching television in the evening might choose to play a game or phone a friend after dinner. Over time, this can weaken the habit loop.

6. Track your progress

Habit tracking can be an effective way to monitor your progress over time, and many find the simple act of noting their progress to provide a small sense of accomplishment (that is, a dopamine release). Habit tracking can also help you identify patterns or trends in your behavior and can also help you stay motivated to change your behavior.

You can find several helpful tracking apps to download to your phone, or you could make your own on a poster or in a journal. However, you track your habits, consider checking in at the same time each day so that you don’t forget.

Therapy for building healthy habits

If you’re finding it particularly challenging to unlearn a bad habit, it may be worth seeking help from a therapist. Mental health professionals often help individuals recover from problematic behavior patterns, including bad habits, compulsions, and addictions. 

Therapies like cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) can be particularly effective for managing and changing behavior patterns. These approaches have been empirically validated across multiple studies, offering strategies to cope with stress, anxiety, and other underlying triggers of bad habits.

Benefits of online therapy

You can find licensed mental health professionals who specialize in these types of therapy through online platforms like BetterHelp . With online therapy, you can schedule sessions that fit into your existing routine and attend them from the location of your choice, potentially making it simple to integrate therapy as a new healthy habit.

Effectiveness of online therapy

Cognitive behavioral therapy is frequently used to break bad habits and establish healthier ones, and many studies report that online CBT tends to be just as effective as its in-person counterpart .

Whether good or bad, repeated behaviors can become wired into the parts of the brain responsible for habits and routines. We often engage in habits without thinking, and in the case of bad habits, this can make them particularly hard to break. However, it may be possible to rewire these brain patterns by understanding the habit loop and addressing each of its components, such as by eliminating the cues, replacing the old habit with a new one, and implementing reward systems and habit trackers. If you’re struggling to break bad habits, therapies like CBT and MBCT might be worth considering. 

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How to break a bad habit

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Make it easier by taking a hard look at motive, modification, and mindset

We all have habits we’d like to get rid of, and every night we give ourselves the same pep talk: I’ll go to bed earlier. I will resist that cookie. I will stop biting my nails. And then tomorrow comes, we cave, and feel worse than bad. We feel defeated and guilty because we know better and still can’t resist.

The cycle is understandable, because the brain doesn’t make changes easily. But breaking an unhealthy habit can be done. It takes intent, a little white-knuckling, and some effective behavior modification techniques. But even before that, it helps to understand what’s happening in our brains, with our motivations, and with our self-talk.

We feel rewarded for certain habits

Good or bad habits are routines, and routines, like showering or driving to work, are automatic and make our lives easier. “The brain doesn’t have to think too much,” says Stephanie Collier, director of education in the division of geriatric psychology at McLean Hospital, and instructor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.

Bad habits are slightly different, but when we try to break a bad one we create dissonance, and the brain doesn’t like that, says Luana Marques, associate professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School. The limbic system in the brain activates the fight-flight-or-freeze responses, and our reaction is to avoid this “threat” and go back to the old behavior, even though we know it’s not good for us.

Often, habits that don’t benefit us still feel good, since the brain releases dopamine. It does this with anything that helps us as a species to survive, like eating or sex. Avoiding change qualifies as survival, and we get rewarded (albeit temporarily), so we keep reverting every time. “That’s why it’s so hard,” Collier says.

Finding the reason why you want to change

But before you try to change a habit, it’s fundamental to identify why you want to change. When the reason is more personal — you want to be around for your kids; you want to travel more — you have a stronger motivation and a reminder to refer back to during struggles.

After that, you want to figure out your internal and external triggers, and that takes some detective work. When the bad-habit urge hits, ask when, where, and with whom it happens, and how you are feeling, be it sad, lonely, depressed, nervous. It’s a mixing and matching process and different for every person, but if you notice a clue beforehand, you might be able to catch yourself, Collier says.

The next part — and sometimes the harder part — is modifying your behavior. If your weakness is a morning muffin on the way to work, the solution might be to change your route. But environments can’t always be altered, so you want to find a replacement, such as having almonds instead of candy or frozen yogurt in lieu of ice cream. “You don’t have to aim for perfect, but just a little bit healthier,” Collier says.

This is an excerpt from an article that appears on the  Harvard Health Publishing website .

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How to (Finally) Break That Bad Habit

Do you have a habit (or two) that you really want to break, but have struggled to in the past? Maybe you spend too much time on your phone, eat unhealthy foods, or overspend on mobile games and online shopping. Whatever the habit is, there are a few steps you’re probably skipping, according to the experts, that will help you finally break it.

Mostly, it all comes down to the cues that lead you to perform the behavior. When you do the behavior over and over again in the same context without thinking, that’s when it becomes a habit. If you haven’t yet read our story about how to build new habits, a lot of the tips in there are relevant to breaking a habit—with a few minor changes and added challenges laid out here, due to your history with the behavior.

The first step to breaking a habit is the same as building one—make a list of the behaviors you’d like to stop doing and put them into priority order. If you try to do everything at once, you’ll likely just get overwhelmed and give up, says Alana Mendelsohn, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist at Columbia’s Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute. Even worse, when we’re stressed out or tired, we instinctively revert back to our established habits—making it harder to break the ones you no longer want.

“I think something that is useful to keep in mind is the longer a time period you’ve had living the way that you have, the harder it’s going to be to change that,” Mendelsohn says.

Once you’ve made your list, you need to think about your history with each habit: When did it start? What triggers it? If you’ve tried to break it previously, what approaches did you take that didn’t work? 

“If you want to change a behavior, then try to identify what might be a trigger that generates the behavior,” says Wendy Wood, provost professor emerita of psychology and business at the University of Southern California and the author of  Good Habits, Bad Habits: The Science of Making Positive Changes That Stick . “We tend to overestimate the extent to which our behavior is driven by our goals and desires, and we underestimate the extent to which it’s driven by habit.” A big part of this can be environmental factors such as marketing and advertising: We see an ad and think it’s something that we want to do or need to have, not that we’re only thinking about it now because we saw the ad.

The main problem people run into when reviewing their history of a habit, Mendelsohn says, is that they may not know what questions to ask or be honest with themselves about the answers. If you find that’s the case for you, she says “a therapist can be incredibly helpful.” Especially if your habit was established when you were younger. “So much of our experience of developing routines and habits is shaped by our families and schools.”

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James Clear, author of  Atomic Habits , adds that looking at data can be a good starting point. “For fitness habits, it could be things like your  Apple Watch or  Whoop band or MyFitnessPal. There are many different ways to get data,” he says. “It also can be true for habits that maybe you wouldn’t think about tracking.” For example, looking at your calendar for the past year to determine whether you spent enough time at home with your family, or whether you were traveling for work too much. “If you’re so busy that you never give yourself time to think about what you’re doing ... it’s really hard to improve, because you’re just busy repeating the same thing again and again. You don’t have a chance to look at the bigger picture.”

Once you’ve done your review of the habits you’d like to break, you should pick one of them to start with.

“I look at a number of the challenges a patient is facing and then ask myself, ‘Which one is in the driver’s seat?’” says Mendelsohn. “Meaning if I tackle one of these problems, are the rest of them likely to get better?”

The next step is to decide how you’re going to go about breaking the habit you’ve chosen, based on your history with it and the context or cues that lead to you performing the behavior. Here are a few examples:

Say you spend too much money and this is the habit you would like to stop. You’ve determined that you started overspending when you added your credit cards to your Apple Wallet or PayPal. This then made it extremely easy to buy things when you saw an ad on social media or a friend sent a link to something they thought you would like. “You want spending money to be as difficult and thoughtful as possible,” Wood says. “Putting all your credit cards on your phone that you carry everywhere is counterproductive—you are further automating the process of spending money.” To fix this, you decide to remove your cards from all online payment services so each time you want to buy something, you have to physically go and pull out the card, which then gives you a bit more time to think about the purchase itself. You could also ask friends not to send you products and unsubscribe from any product marketing emails.

If you’re trying to check your phone less often, David Kadavy, author of  Mind Management, Not Time Management , suggests locking it in a lockbox for part of the day. “Make it as hard as possible to actually perform the habit,” he says. While you’re still going to get the cue to check your phone, the effort of going to the lockbox and unlocking it can help block the behavior from triggering. Or, say you’re trying to check social media less often: “Just delete the social media apps from your phone,” says Kadavy. “Block them with the parental controls or, at the very least, don’t have them on your home screen.”

Clear has a great example of a negative eating habit from his own life. In the house he used to live in, there was a McDonald’s right after the highway exit on his way home. He found himself stopping there multiple times a week. “I looked at myself after the last one, and I was like, ‘Am I going to do this every time I drive home? Am I just going to stop here and eat here every single time?’” he says. “Ultimately, what I decided to do was to start taking a different path home. If I went left off of the exit instead of right, it would take an extra three minutes, but I wouldn’t pass the McDonald’s. I changed the environment so that I wouldn’t be exposed to the cue. That added enough friction and enough separation that the habit would change.”

“A lot of people tend to procrastinate, then rely on anxiety and fear to motivate them to get tasks done,” says Mendelsohn. “This can be effective at getting things done, but at the cost of causing unnecessary stress. Breaking tasks down into smaller ones can be a harder strategy to implement at first, but more sustainable in the long run.” To help you get started, Mendelsohn suggests writing these tasks down using a pen and paper, as it can be “really helpful for people to keep their organizational strategies separate from the digital tools we use all day.”

Sometimes, substituting a negative behavior for a more desirable one can work at blocking it—but, Wood says you have to know what the cue is, and the alternative behavior has to be both easy and rewarding. Say you’ve decided to drink a glass of water whenever you have the urge to look at your phone, instead of locking it away somewhere or putting it facedown next to you. “For most people, drinking a glass of water isn’t going to be as interesting as looking at their phones, so I don’t know if that’s going to work particularly well,” says Wood.

If your chosen way to try and break your habit isn’t working, maybe it’s time to try something else. Another thing to keep in mind is that “for some specific behaviors, like quitting smoking, multiple attempts is actually a good thing,” Wood says. “Because most people who ultimately quit have to keep trying until they figure out the right thing that will work for them.”

So don’t get discouraged if it’s taking a while to break your habit. Sometimes you just need to approach it a different way or dig deeper into the context or cues that lead you to perform it in the first place.

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Essay on How to Break Bad Habits

What are bad habits and where do they come from? How to recognize a bad habit? How can something that we like be to the detriment of our physical and mental health? What are the effective ways to break bad habits? In this essay, I will try to answer all these questions. Do not consider my work as a guide to help someone get rid of bad habits. These are more thoughts of mine that some people may find handy or even helpful.

What Is a Bad Habit?

When someone says “bad habit”, smoking or alcohol are the first things that come to our mind. However, the term is much deeper in sense. Sometimes, we have bad habits without even realizing they are bad. As stated earlier, it is not only about smoking or drinking. Bad habits may refer to a passive way of life, using swear words, eating unhealthy food, or suffering from low self-esteem, lack of self-confidence, boredom, and so on.

In other words, a bad habit is any action that can be to the detriment of health, mood, or even state of mind. What’s more, we need to take into account actions that may harm not only ourselves but also people who surround us. The problem appears to be more complicated than it seems and we need to figure out the main cause of bad habits first.

What Factors Cause Bad Habits

I am concerned that all bad habits mainly result in two reasons. They include boredom and stress. As a rule, people wrong things whenever they need to cope with stress or deal with an unpleasant situation. Every time a person had a fight with the dear one or problems at work, he or she tries to handle them with the help of alcohol or a cigarette just to chill out a bit.

Unfortunately, none of those can bring us to a normal life. What’s more, they may even make things worse and lead to more serious troubles.

The only way to prevent those consequences is to be able to recognize the bad habit on time until it becomes too late. This is where a person may become addicted to smoking, junk food, and so on. The next stage is to break the bad habit.

Steps to Break Bad Habits

After we have successfully identified habits we need to break, we need to get prepared. The task is not as easy as some may think. It will require discipline and patience. Some may start feeling bad. However, the situation will improve in the near future along with your state of mind and well-being. So, the main steps are as follows:

• Find the alternative – a fast and simple way to give up the bad habit. All you need is to substitute it with something less harmful. For example, when you give up smoking, chewing gum can bring great relief. The idea is to keep your mouth busy with it and forget about cigarettes.
• Team up with friends – one is very likely to have a friend or relative with the same problem and the aim of giving it up. A good idea is to team up and try to fight the bad habit back together. You may support each other every time it is hard. Another way is to set several triggers. For example, every time both of you want to smoke you start running instead.
• Create a harmonious atmosphere – the best way to get rid of stress and boredom, which are the main cause of bad habits, is to be among people who love you. They will always find encouraging words or help when you alone fail to cope with the problem.
• Set clear targets – it is not only about visualizing yourself without beer or a cigarette. It is about real actions and steps to take when breaking the habit. Create an outline or plan with schedules and timeframes.

Stick to that plan and try to build your new identity that is not dependent on boredom, stress, or other external factors.

The key to success is to understand your sole responsibility for obtaining a bad habit after having your back against the wall because of some problems. However, it does not mean you are supposed to judge yourself. We are all humans, and all humans make mistakes. It is absolutely natural for every person. The question is how we are going to get over those problems.

On the one hand, the process of breaking bad habits can be very tough and time-consuming. You may have to limit yourself, which will result in more inconveniences at first. However, it is certainly worth taking those steps in case you want to live a full life, have good health, and the ability to cope with any trouble with ease.

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Bad Habits Are Hard to Break—These Tips Can Help

Sharon Basaraba is an award-winning reporter and senior scientific communications advisor for Alberta Health Services in Alberta, Canada.

webphotographeer / Getty Images

How Is a Bad Habit Reinforced?

Steps to breaking a bad habit, a word from verywell.

It often feels like everyone is talking about habits. There are supposedly a million little habits that can 'change your life', but what about getting rid of the ones that inhibit us from becoming our best selves?

Habits are a valuable part of a healthy lifestyle because good daily behaviors get locked in as they become automatic. However (though we may not always like to admit it), we all have bad habits, which can range from the merely inconvenient like biting your nails, to seriously longevity-threatening like smoking. But man are bad habits hard to break!

Unfortunately, there's no single answer that will work for everyone. However, just becoming aware of your negative behaviors is an important first step. Habits develop with repetition. Understanding the pattern that supports a bad habit can then help you short-circuit the loop.

As New York Times investigative reporter Charles Duhigg outlines in his authoritative book The Power of Habit , all undesirable behaviors share these fundamental traits:

• An external cue or trigger
• A routine that ensues
• An inherent reward for the behavior

Let's dig into some of the reasons we perpetuate our bad habits and unpack some (admittedly, probably not so easy) ways to overcome them.

At a Glance

The information in this article should help you devise a plan to break a bad habit, and perhaps substitute a healthier or more positive behavior in place of the negative one. If it's social contact you desire, plan a walk with a friend instead of drinks at the end of your work shift; if it's a calm moment in a frantic day, consider a mini- meditation session to refocus. You need to find the cue, identify the reward, and trust that very small behaviors can lead to big change.

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It's easy to see that a habit like brushing your teeth may be triggered by bedtime (the cue), the teeth brushing itself (the routine) follows, and the reward delivered (mouth tastes clean and fresh, bedtime readiness is underway).

Even negative behaviors offer a reward of some kind. Perhaps it's anxiety relief, as it might be in the case of cigarette smoking; maybe you crave social contact and find it most easily over too many drinks at the bar after a stressful day at work . Unless you try and dissect the powerful components of this loop, you are doomed to repeat the bad habit.

According to Duhigg's research, the only way to short-circuit the habitual pattern is to identify the cue, the routine, and the reward they deliver. Since the habit (the routine) might be more obvious as the behavior you're trying to eliminate, the greater challenge can be isolating the cue and the reward.

Try these strategies to help you interrupt the cycle of negative behavior.

"It's important to remember that any change (good or bad) can feel overwhelming. When we want to change a behavior, it can be difficult (but not impossible!) and take time. We need to be patient and kind to ourselves," says Rachel Goldman, PhD.

Find the Cue

Try writing down at least five events that occur the moment the urge for the automatic behavior hits, to reveal the cue. Ask yourself who else is on the scene, what time of day it is, or what happened immediately prior? After a few days, the cue should become evident.

Identify the Reward

This can be more difficult and may require a bit of experimentation. Try altering the routine to get a different reward. Is it the fresh air? Does it provide a distraction? Or is it an energy boost?

Be curious and open to whatever you discover. Duhigg recommends writing down your impressions or emotions as the routine wraps up. After a few tries, the reward may be revealed.

Small Changes Make a Big Difference

Sometimes a simple tweak can derail an entrenched habit. For example, a team of psychologists led by David Neal of the University of Southern California studied subjects eating popcorn at a movie theater. The cinema setting was the contextual cue.

Subjects ate the popcorn regardless of whether they were hungry, and even when it was stale. When asked to use their non-dominant hand (for example, a right-hander forced to eat with their left hand), however, the habitual eating stopped.

Published in 2011 in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin , the study concludes that disrupting the automatic consumption pattern brought the subjects' eating under "intentional control." In other words, the unconscious eating habit stopped, and the subjects became more aware of what they were doing.

Replace Bad Habits With Good Ones

When we've been doing something consistently for many years it takes up a specific amount of time in our lives. That time is filled with you doing something, so when you stop a bad habit that time can suddenly feel like a void.

For instance if we bite our nails or pick at our cuticles when we're idling, we associate doing something with our hands during the in-between moments. Instead of stopping the hand centric action altogether, you might try buying a fidget toy that you can play with in order to replace the finger biting or picking.

If you tend to go out to a bar with friends after work but you want to drink less, you don't have to stop hanging out with your friends. Have fun trying out the different mocktails your local bar offers, or suggest meeting up at a place that has fun coffee and tea options in addition to alcohol.

Neal DT, Wood W, Wu M, Kurlander D. The pull of the past: when do habits persist despite conflict with motives? Pers Soc Psychol Bull . 2011;37(11):1428-37. doi:10.1177/0146167211419863

Charles Duhigg. The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do In Life and Business . Random House. 2012.

National Institute of Health. Breaking bad habits . US National Institutes of Health Public Information Sheet. Published January 2012.

By Sharon Basaraba Sharon Basaraba is an award-winning reporter and senior scientific communications advisor for Alberta Health Services in Alberta, Canada.

Process of Quitting a Bad Habit Essay

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The only way of quitting a bad habit that seems to be most effective one is to replace it with a good habit. Human nature cannot tolerate a hole or vacuum in life, if anybody wants to eliminate a bad habit from his or her personality, it is required to fill that gap with something influential and positive. Otherwise, that vacuum might follow a path of least resistance and get filled with the same bad habit again.

Undoubtedly, process of quitting or replacing bad habit is very difficult and emotional. It requires motivation and determination as well as an aim with a defined time limitation. In this paper, we will discuss the important steps that may help achieve the targeted goal.

People who realize that they need to bring change in their lives by quitting their particular bad habit can easily achieve their target as compared to those who fear facing problems during the process of quitting bad habit. They are more likely to deny the fact that quitting bad habit can alter their lifestyle in a better manner. As a beginner, it is vital to take a start by defining particular attitude aims (Brizer, 2011). It can be done by altering daily activities and gradual changing the behavioural characteristics.

Do not try to do it alone, as it is a crucial attempt. It needs motivation from such a partner who is also willing to quit the same bad habit. For example, if two persons try to quit smoking together then it becomes easier to get success. Otherwise, it has been noted that when a person sees another person with the same bad habit he or she loses motivation and turns back to the same old habit (Brizer, 2011). But, if one individual with the same goal keeps on motivating another partner during the critical process of kicking bad habit it surely brings a positive change.

Quitting or developing any habit is not that easy as it might seem to be. It needs time along with determination. A person needs to maintain a diary or calendar in which sub-goals should be mentioned with timeline. It means this process also needs proper planning before implementation. For example, if a person drinks 15 cups of tea daily, he or she needs to cut down the number of cups slowly and accordingly i.e. cutting down two tea cups per week. Also, hourly division can help in this situation (Lock & Grange, 2004).

Such as, if a person is addicted to puff two cigarettes in an hour then he or she should try to take one cigarette per hour. At this stage during the process of quitting bad habit, it is significant to replace bad habit with the positive ones. In such a situation, physical exercise, intake of healthy foods, and spending time with friends and family can help overcome a bad habit successfully (Febish, Febish, & Oxley, 2011). For example, if a person is habitual of drinking too many soft drinks, it will be very helpful for such a person to drink a chill glass of water to fulfil the urge of having soft drink.

During the process of overcoming the bad habit, slippage also gives motivation to the person. For example, if a person is aiming to quit habit of eating too many chocolates in order to put off some weight then after following a strict diet plan for two or three weeks that person can eat a piece of cake or a sweet – say once in a fifteen days (Febish, Febish, & Oxley, 2011).

It will give him or her motivation that he or she is not being completely deprived from what he loves to eat the most. It is a known fact that quitting bad habit can make a person frustrated or aggressive. It does not mean that the person starts giving headache to his family members or friends because that person is not getting, what he or she is addicted to (Brizer, 2011).

It is because this attitude can affect their behaviour and relations with others in an adverse manner. One should continue to realize the significant importance of bringing change in the life by quitting a bad habit. Self-motivation and rewarding are other important factors that play key role during the whole process. It is vital to keep on rewarding yourself for all the initial steps you may undertake daily. Also, other people may also reward you (Lock & Grange, 2004). Try to meet those people, who can appreciate you for the change and those who could get motivation from the positive changes in your personality or behaviour.

From the above process analysis of quitting bad habit, it has been observed that the will of a person is the foremost important without which no one can bring change in his or her life. Process of quitting bad habit requires inspiration and courage of face all difficult phases of the process and to attain the targeted aim successfully.

Brizer, D. (2011). Quitting Smoking For Dummies. New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons.

Febish, G., Febish, G., & Oxley, J. (2011). Food for Thought. New York: Xlibris Corporation.

Lock, J., & Grange, D. (2004). Help your teenager beat an eating disorder. New York: Guilford Press.

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Essay on Bad Habits

Students are often asked to write an essay on Bad Habits in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Bad Habits

Understanding bad habits.

Bad habits are actions we repeat that harm us. They can be physical, like biting nails, or mental, like procrastination.

Why Bad Habits Form

Bad habits often form because they give us temporary pleasure. However, they harm us in the long run.

The Impact of Bad Habits

Bad habits can harm our health, relationships, and productivity. They prevent us from reaching our full potential.

Overcoming Bad Habits

To overcome bad habits, we must understand why we do them. Then, we can replace them with good habits that benefit us.

Also check:

• 10 Lines on Bad Habits
• Paragraph on Bad Habits

250 Words Essay on Bad Habits

Introduction to bad habits.

Bad habits are often the result of patterns of behavior that have become ingrained in our daily routines. They are actions that we engage in repeatedly, usually without giving much thought to their consequences. These habits can range from the seemingly innocuous, such as nail-biting, to the more harmful, such as smoking or excessive drinking.

The Psychology Behind Bad Habits

Understanding the psychology behind bad habits is crucial. They often serve as coping mechanisms for stress or discomfort, providing a temporary sense of relief or distraction. The brain’s reward system plays a significant role in their formation and persistence. When a behavior triggers the release of ‘feel-good’ chemicals like dopamine, it reinforces the habit loop, making it harder to break.

Bad habits can have far-reaching impacts on our lives. They can negatively affect our physical health, mental wellbeing, productivity, and relationships. For instance, procrastination can lead to stress and poor performance, while excessive screen time can lead to sleep disturbances and social disconnection.

Breaking the Cycle

Breaking bad habits requires conscious effort, patience, and persistence. It involves understanding the triggers, replacing the habit with a healthier alternative, and rewarding oneself for progress. Cognitive-behavioral techniques, mindfulness, and self-compassion can also be beneficial in this process.

In conclusion, while bad habits can be challenging to overcome, understanding their psychological underpinnings and impacts can provide us with the tools to break the cycle. With effort and determination, we can replace these harmful patterns with healthier behaviors, leading to improved wellbeing and quality of life.

500 Words Essay on Bad Habits

Introduction.

Bad habits are behaviors we engage in repetitively, often unconsciously, that are detrimental to our physical, mental, or emotional well-being. They range from minor annoyances such as nail-biting to life-threatening addictions like smoking and drug use. The complexity of bad habits lies in their deeply ingrained nature, making them difficult to break. However, understanding their psychological underpinnings can provide us with the tools to combat them effectively.

The Psychology of Bad Habits

Bad habits are often rooted in our brain’s reward system. The brain releases dopamine, a neurotransmitter responsible for feelings of pleasure and satisfaction, whenever we engage in activities it perceives as beneficial. Unfortunately, this system can be hijacked by harmful behaviors that provide immediate gratification, such as overeating or excessive use of social media.

Another psychological aspect of bad habits is their association with stress and negative emotions. Many people resort to unhealthy coping mechanisms, such as alcohol consumption or compulsive shopping, to deal with feelings of anxiety, sadness, or boredom. These habits serve as temporary distractions but can lead to long-term harm.

Bad habits can have far-reaching consequences. Physically, they can lead to health problems such as obesity, heart disease, and lung cancer. Mentally, they can contribute to conditions like depression and anxiety. Socially, they can strain relationships and hinder productivity. Moreover, the financial cost of maintaining certain bad habits, such as smoking or gambling, can be substantial.

Breaking Bad Habits

Breaking bad habits is a challenging but achievable task. It requires self-awareness, determination, and a strategic approach. The first step is recognizing the habit and understanding its triggers. This can be achieved through mindful observation and introspection.

Next, it’s important to replace the bad habit with a healthier alternative. For instance, if stress triggers cigarette smoking, one could try stress management techniques such as meditation or exercise instead. It’s also beneficial to set realistic goals and celebrate small victories along the way to maintain motivation.

In conclusion, bad habits are deeply ingrained behaviors that can have significant impacts on our well-being. They are often rooted in our brain’s reward system and can serve as unhealthy coping mechanisms for stress and negative emotions. However, with self-awareness, determination, and a strategic approach, we can break these habits and replace them with healthier alternatives. Understanding the psychology of bad habits is a crucial step towards achieving this goal.

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How to break bad habits: 7 tips to succeed

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What is a bad habit?

8 bad habit examples, how are habits formed, how to recognize bad habits, the importance of breaking habits, how long does it take to break a bad habit, how to change a bad habit: 7 tips, slow and steady.

The alarm clock goes off, and you head straight to the kitchen for coffee. On your way to work, you tune into the news or scan through social media. Once you sit down to work, you immediately dive into emails. Your day is full of habits, some so deeply embedded that you probably don’t even notice them. 

Habits are a big part of your day. Some help you put your brain on autopilot, aiding efficiency and reducing your mental load. Other habits keep you healthy, like eating a balanced lunch or hitting the gym on your way home from work. Frequently snacking sugary candies or opening social media to distract yourself from a challenging task have the opposite effect. And habits that are compulsions or addictions, like smoking or overspending, can even threaten your well-being. 

The key to learning how to break bad habits starts with understanding how habits form and endure, giving you tools to reinforce good behaviors and curb bad ones.

A bad habit is a routine that persists even when it’s harmful to your well-being , according to a meta-analysis published in Frontiers in Psychology. 

Sometimes, you might intentionally engage in bad habits, like procrastinating on a difficult assignment despite its importance. You know it’s not a good habit , but the temporary feeling of relief convinces you otherwise. Other times, bad habits may be more subtle, like the frequent urge to check emails or social media when faced with challenging tasks. 

Over time, such habits can diminish your ability to concentrate effectively , impacting your productivity and potential for learning and professional growth.

Bad habits aren’t always easy to spot. They can creep into your daily routines without you even realizing it. Let’s spotlight a list of bad habits that may hinder your ability to show up at work and protect your well-being. 

Learning how to stop bad habits starts with awareness. Recognizing their influence on daily life will help you create targeted strategies for positive new behavior.

While many of your habits form unconsciously, each one passes through a three-step neurological process . It begins when your brain links a cue to a behavior. The connection is reinforced through repetition, which stimulates a reward. Let’s break it down further: 

• Cue: This is the first spark that ignites a habit loop. It occurs when your brain identifies a distinct trigger associated with a specific action. This cue serves as your reminder, prompting your brain to prepare to act. 
• Routine: Once your brain recognizes the cue, you transition into a specific set of actions. This routine might become so ingrained that the behavior is automated, requiring little conscious effort.  
• Reward: You feel an emotional or physical payoff after completing the action. This reward reinforces the cue-routine loop, making it more likely the behavior will be repeated the next time the cue is encountered. 

Let’s imagine a common daily occurrence. A ping noise notifies you of a new message on Slack. The sound cues you to instinctively open the messenger app. The ensuing satisfaction feels rewarding, like quickly clearing a notification or responding to a critical message. Over time, you automatically check messages as they roll in, steering your focus and slowing down your productivity.

Some habits can subtly become part of your daily routine. They may be so embedded in your approach to work it’s difficult to step back and see the negative impact on your growth and well-being. Here are four telltale signs of bad habits: 

• Disruption in your productivity: Tasks constantly take longer than they should, or you regularly fall behind schedule. Frequently checking emails, grabbing your phone to distract yourself, or engaging in too much office chatter are examples of behaviors that break your focus. 
• Physical and mental exhaustion: Feeling tired all the time without a clear reason could result from bad routines, like regularly staying up late, eating too much junk food, or not getting enough physical exercise . 
• Decreased satisfaction: If tasks or activities you previously enjoyed now feel burdensome, it might indicate that a bad habit is diminishing your energy. For example, constantly multitasking might drain your enthusiasm for exciting work tasks. 
• Avoidance behavior: Regularly sidestepping specific tasks or responsibilities is a red flag for an avoidance habit. This may be a coping mechanism to dodge challenging or uncomfortable tasks. If you tend to delay high-priority tasks for easier ones, you may have a procrastination habit that covers up a fear of failure or perfectionism . 

Paying attention to the signs or asking for guidance will help you learn how to change a bad habit. And being proactive in identifying these bad habits ensures a more balanced life and professional growth.

When left unchecked, bad habits can erode the quality of your work, strain relationships, and hinder learning and growth. Quitting bad habits isn’t just about improving your productivity. It’s about improving your overall well-being. Here’s why learning how to get rid of a bad habit will lead to deeper professional satisfaction:

• Preserves professional reputation: Proactively addressing bad habits helps solidify your standing as a dependable team member. Demonstrating active learning and self-improvement reinforces trust and can open doors to better yourself with new opportunities and bigger responsibilities. 
• Protects your health: Prioritizing good sleep , regular physical exercise, and balanced nutrition contributes to solid physical and mental health. These positive new habits can lead to increased energy, better focus, and overall well-being. 
• Enhanced productivity: Replacing habits like frequent task-switching with focused work sessions or substituting unlimited access to your cell phone with scheduled breaks streamlines your work. Setting clear priorities and reducing distractions creates space for better output and more quality free time.
• Improved self-confidence: Kicking old habits and developing new routines is difficult. The sense of accomplishment you get from positive behavior change will fill you with confidence to take on new challenges head-on.

Learning how to break a bad habit and adopt a healthier one varies widely from one person to the next. A report published in the European Journal of Social Psychology, which observed 96 participants, found that the time required for habit formation ranged from 18 to 254 days . Although breaking a habit doesn’t have a set time frame, replacing it with a healthier habit falls into this same time frame. 

A crucial insight from the study was the emphasis on consistency. While participants occasionally slipped up, staying focused on positive change was pivotal to lasting healthy habits . So, if you’re frustrated with the process, stay consistent — it’ll pay off in the long run.

Learning how to get rid of a bad habit isn’t a simple feat. With self-awareness and determination, you’ll be on your way to positive habit change. Here are seven simple ways you can replace bad behaviors with constructive habits:

1. Understand why you want to change

Figuring out how to break a habit that negatively impacts you starts with introspection. Identify the reasons you want to change a habit. Maybe you want to improve your professional performance, build better relationships, or enhance your confidence. 

Whatever it is, understanding the “why” behind your journey will be a powerful intrinsic motivator in tough times. Write it down somewhere to remind yourself why you want to kick a bad habit in the first place.

2. Acknowledge the process of change

Change is gradual. Learn to celebrate small victories along the way and set up barriers to curb negative self-talk and overcome setbacks. 

3. Out of sight, out of mind

Reduce exposure to cues that trigger the bad habit. If you struggle to turn away from social media, remove apps from your home screen, use focus apps, or put your phone in another room. Having your phone in your line of sight can hinder your performance — so try putting it and any other distractors in another room.

4. Make it unattractive

Nip the reward in the bud. Associating the negative consequences with the bad habit may motivate more self-control . For example, remind yourself of the lost free time or increased worry when you procrastinate. 

5. Make it difficult

Increase the effort required to engage in bad habits. If you’re trying to reduce snacking on junk food, don’t keep it at home or in the office. The added effort to feed your bad habit might deter you. 

6. Replace bad with good

Rather than focusing on quitting an unwanted habit cold turkey, concentrate on building a positive new habit in its place. Introducing a positive behavior that occupies the same space as the negative one can create a more natural transition. 

For instance, if you want to stop checking social media before bed, consider replacing the behavior with a few minutes of meditation or reading. The approach will help you reinforce reward and positive outcomes. 

7. Seek support

Working with a professional coach specializing in career or behavioral coaching can give you the support you need. Their expertise can fast-track your progress, helping you build realistic action plans and giving you accountability to charge forward.

You didn’t form bad habits overnight. It took time and repetition to cement them in your routines. Learning how to break bad habits will take time, too. 

Give yourself the courtesy of self-compassion and patience. A little introspection, empathy, and dedication to positive change will keep you on course — whether it takes 18 or 254 days to reach the finish line.

Transform your life

Make meaningful changes and become the best version of yourself. BetterUp's professional Coaches are here to support your personal growth journey.

Elizabeth Perry, ACC

Elizabeth Perry is a Coach Community Manager at BetterUp. She uses strategic engagement strategies to cultivate a learning community across a global network of Coaches through in-person and virtual experiences, technology-enabled platforms, and strategic coaching industry partnerships. With over 3 years of coaching experience and a certification in transformative leadership and life coaching from Sofia University, Elizabeth leverages transpersonal psychology expertise to help coaches and clients gain awareness of their behavioral and thought patterns, discover their purpose and passions, and elevate their potential. She is a lifelong student of psychology, personal growth, and human potential as well as an ICF-certified ACC transpersonal life and leadership Coach.

Building good habits in your life (and ditching bad ones)

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• Speech Writing /

How to Tackle a Bad Habit? Free Speech Samples for Students

• Updated on  
• Nov 22, 2023

Tackling a bad habit requires dedication and strategic thinking, which can increase your chances of success in life. School students often indulge in bad habits, such as unhealthy beverages, smoking, skimping on sleep, not exercising, etc. Our bad habits are determined by self-awareness, reflection and understanding their effects on our goals and lives. A person’s character cannot be defined by their bad habits, but they must be addressed with appropriate planning and replaced with positive habits. Doing so will fill the void left by bad habits and will contribute to more lasting changes. Below we have discussed a speech on ‘How to tackle bad habits’ for students.

Table of Contents

• 1 Top 10 Bad Habits Students Must Break
• 2 1-minute Speech on How to Tackle a Bad Habit
• 3.1 Psychological Tips to Tackle Bad Habits

Also Read: 160+ Best and Easy English Speech Topics for Students

Top 10 Bad Habits Students Must Break

Here are 10 bad habits that students must break for a better lifestyle. Feel free to use them as examples in your speech or writing topics.

• Binge eating
• Skimping on sleep
• Overuse of electronic devices
• Negative self-talk
• Procrastination
• Multitasking during studies 
• Not drinking enough water
• Lack of organisation
• Neglecting self-care
• Poor time management

Also Read: How to Stop Procrastinating?

1-minute Speech on How to Tackle a Bad Habit

‘My warm regards to everyone present here. I’m here to give a speech on ‘How to tackle a bad habit.’ Changing our habits is a difficult process and can cause a lot of pain to our mind and body. However, if we acknowledge our habit, confront it with sheer willpower, and understand the triggers and patterns that drive this behaviour.’

‘Set our clear and realistic goals. This can be done by breaking down the habit into manageable processes, allowing you to focus on each part in depth. On top of that, celebrate your short victories and plan forward with a stronger mindset.’

‘Seeking support from your friends and family will create a support system. This can offer you accountability and encouragement when you are struggling. Changing bad habits will take time and patience. Your consistent efforts to give up on bad habits will be your biggest strength and will surely help you to overcome them. 

Thank you.’

Also Read: 2-minute Speech On Dussehra in English

Also Read: Gandhi Jayanti Speech

Easy Speech on How to Tackle a Bad Habit

‘Hello and welcome to my fellow classmates and teachers. Today, I stand before you to present my speech on ‘How to tackle a bad habit.’ We all have one or more bad habits which interfere with our day-to-day life, which not only affects our mental health, but our physical health too. Quite often, these negative behaviours affect our individual goals, happiness and quality of life.’

‘Tacking bad habits can be a challenging task and most of us struggle to break them. From biting nails to procrastinating, these habits can interfere with our life and future in multiple ways. They can prevent us from achieving our goals, damaging our relationships, and negatively impacting our health. However, there are ways to overcome these bad habits and create a better future for ourselves.’

‘The first step in breaking a bad habit is to acknowledge that it exists. Accepting harsh reality can prove to be beneficial, as it will give you an idea about our current position. Once you have recognized the habit and its negative effects, appropriate measures can be taken.’

‘Another step will be to replace a bad habit with an alternative option. Consider this example; a lot of young people indulge in overeating in times of stress. Instead of this, try to take a walk or perform a physical activity. Studies have shown that during workouts, endorphins are released, which act as natural painkillers and mood lifters.’

‘Finally, working patiently and persistently is the key to breaking your bad habits. It takes time and consistent efforts to break one’s bad habits as they have been developed over time. A person’s positive attitude and commitment can help them overcome bad habits and create a brighter future for themselves.’

Also Read: Speech On Women Should Rule The World

Psychological Tips to Tackle Bad Habits

Did you know you can tackle bad habits with easy and effective psychological tips? Experts suggest seeking help from others in times of hardship, but on an individual level too, a person can tackle a bad habit in real-time and come out with flying colours. Let’s discuss some psychological tips to tackle bad habits for students.

Self-Awareness

Understand what triggers your bad habits. Is it your friend circle? Or your mental stress due to academic pressure? Knowing the source that triggers your bad habits is the first and most important part of tackling them. 

Replace With Positive Habits

One of the most effective ways to tackle your bad habits is to replace them with positive and enjoyable activities that trigger your brain’s reward centre. Exercising can be an effective way to tackle bad habits like binge eating, smoking, etc.

Set Short and Realistic Goals

Breaking your habit into smaller and manageable steps can help you to focus on each part clearly. These changes are more sustainable and easier to integrate into daily life.

Mindfulness and Meditation

Raising awareness about your thoughts and behaviours can be aided through mindfulness and meditation. Building the cycle of self-discipline through meditation can help overcome cravings and impulses associated with bad habits.

Visualising Temptation Situation

Mentally practising good habits over bad ones will surely help overcome unhealthy habits. For example, if you are at a party, and see everyone around you drinking and eating junk food, imagine yourself drinking water and holding a glass of water in your hand to keep your hands busy.

How to tackle a bad habit: Bad habits are unhealthy behaviours which affect our mental and physical health. We are consciously aware of these bad habits and yet we are doing them repetitively, because of the pleasure they offer us. Breaking bad habits requires determination, patience and other skills which collectively work to achieve the desired goals. Consulting an expert or a mentor can be a good choice, with whom you can discuss what triggers your behaviour to indulge in that bad habit.

Here are 5 common bad habits of students: Binge eating, Skimping on sleep, Overuse of electronic devices, Negative self-talk and Procrastination.

Talking bad habits in a month requires rigorous hard work and complete isolation from the environment which triggers your behaviour. Surround yourself with positive people who will constantly encourage you to participate in healthy activities. Read books and watch documentaries where the negative sides of bad habits are highlighted. Visualise a temptation situation where you can place yourself and imagine how good it will look if you practice a different approach.

Related Articles

For more information on such informative speech topics for your school, visit our speech writing page and follow Leverage Edu .

Shiva Tyagi

With an experience of over a year, I've developed a passion for writing blogs on wide range of topics. I am mostly inspired from topics related to social and environmental fields, where you come up with a positive outcome.

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How To Break A Bad Habit (Essay Sample) 2023

Table of Contents

How To Break A Bad Habit

How Can I Get Essay For Free and Is it realistic to expect a low-cost, High-Quality Essay from a Cheap Paper Writing Service ?

How to break a bad habit

Quitting a habit that has already been deeply embedded in your system is very difficult. The hardest part is making the commitment to break the bad habit as it involves a great amount of energy in order for it to be integrated in a new lifestyle.

Stress and boredom are the primary causes of bad habits. Usually, these acts are our ways of coping with boredom and dealing with stress. Each habit is an expenditure of your energy for probably non-beneficial effort or acts. From nail biting to chronic shopping, or drinking every day or simple as browsing the internet all day, bad habits can drain us of our energy and focus.

However, all hope is not lost for the power to change bad habits lies at the center of everyone. We are human beings capable of manipulating our reality and thus our own lives. One can learn about new and healthy ways of living and battling stress and boredom. If you are able to successfully choose a substitute for your bad habit, then you can direct your energy towards more beneficial and productive acts.

Obviously, infrequently the anxiety or fatigue that is at first glance is really caused by more profound issues. These issues can be difficult to consider, however in the event that you’re not kidding about rolling out improvements then you must be straightforward with yourself. Perceiving the reasons for your unfortunate propensities is critical to conquering them.

Pick a substitute for your unfortunate propensity. You need an arrangement early for how you will react when you confront the anxiety or fatigue that prompts your negative behavior pattern. What are you going to do when you get the inclination to smoke?  What are you going to do when Facebook is calling to you to stall?  Whatever it is and whatever you’re managing, you need an arrangement for what you will do rather than your unfortunate propensity.

Cut out whatever number triggers as could be expected under the circumstances. On the off chance that you smoke when you drink, at that point don’t go to the bar. In the event that you eat treats when they are in the house, at that point discard them all. In the event that the principal thing you do when you sit on the lounge chair is get the TV remote, at that point shroud the remote in a storeroom in an alternate room. Make it less demanding on yourself to get out from under negative behavior patterns by maintaining a strategic distance from the things that triggers them.

You could also pair up with someone and quit together. Having a partner can be very advantageous as two heads are better than one. Each can remind each other of the commitment to quitting and having someone with you makes you more conscious and accountable for the responsibility that you are intending to enact. You can also celebrate your victories together and trach each other’s progress through camaraderie and inspiration. You can share the motivation with each other and encourage one another to be able to replace the bad habit with a good one.

You don’t need to become another person, you simply need to come back to the old you. So regularly we believe that to bring an end to our negative behavior patterns, we have to end up noticeably a totally new individual. In all actuality, you as of now have it in you to be somebody without your negative behavior patterns. Actually, it’s improbable that you had these negative behavior patterns the greater part of your life. You don’t have to stop smoking, you simply need to come back to being a non–smoker. You don’t have to change into a sound individual, you simply need to come back to being solid. Regardless of the possibility that it was years back, you have just lived without this negative behavior pattern, which implies you can most certainly do it once more.

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Break That Bad Habit - For Good This Time

Finally, the plan your overstuffed stomach, chewed nails and/or stiff-as-a-board body have been waiting for, so you can get on with your good intentions.

• More than 40 percent of our daily actions happen habitually — but recognizing what triggers the unhealthy ones is in your control.
• Turn a crappy habit into a positive one by making it tougher to do.
• When you’re tempted to revert to your old ways, having a backup plan can prevent progress blips.

Read on to learn more…

How many times have you tried to quit drinking soda, cut down on screen time, or stop falling asleep with the TV on? How badly did you beat yourself up each time you failed?

If you answered “lots” and “very,” it’s time for a whole new approach to getting on top of your bad habits so you can stop them from mucking up your wellness goals.

“You can’t force yourself to change your bad behavior,” says Wendy Wood, PhD, the provost professor of psychology and business at the University of Southern California and a researcher who’s spent decades studying how we form and change habits. (She’s also written a book all about it called Good Habits, Bad Habits: The Science of Making Positive Changes That Stick .) Your self-control and willpower will inevitably fade. To break negative patterns, says Wood, you need to go after the source and change your brain.

Whether the habit is chain-smoking or going to the gym regularly, it’s the same to our brain, says Judson Brewer, MD, PhD, the director of research and innovation at the Brown University Mindfulness Center and author of The Craving Mind . “Something triggers your mind to cause you to behave a certain way, and that behavior cues a reward in your brain,” says Brewer. You settle in for an afternoon meeting or class (trigger), guzzle a soda (behavior), get a rush of sugar (reward). Often, this all happens without you actually thinking about it.

In fact, 43 percent of the actions you take every day are habitual and unconscious, says Wood. Operating on autopilot is fantastic for good habits but sucks for the things you wish you didn’t do. To act with more intention and attack the root of the problem instead of yourself, follow this five-step accountability plan.

1. Map out your bad habits.

To stop endlessly scrolling on your phone or eating that second (OK, third) brownie, you need to understand why these patterns are happening, says Brewer. To do it, take out a pen and paper, and for each bad habit you have, write down its trigger, the behavior and the reward. Let’s use scrolling as an example. Your trigger might be seeing a friend pull out their phone, and the behavior is that you pull out your phone too and start thumbing through social media. The reward could be seeing a couple of likes on the last picture you posted or laughing at a too-relatable meme. This trigger-behavior-reward loop is hardwired into your brain, says Brewer, and knowing it’s there is the first step to squashing it. “If you’re not aware it’s happening, game over,” he says. “You’ll never be able to stop.”

2. Change the context.

An easy way to break that bad habit loop: Avoid triggers. Locations, times of day, even the people around you can all be subconscious triggers, says Wood. Take responsibility for tweaking those cues and you can make real behavior progress. If you notice that every time you sit on your couch and open your laptop, you reach for a snack, try opening your computer only at a desk or table, where you’re trained to be in work, not lounge, mode. If you reach for your phone or TV remote every night before you go to sleep, leave it in another room and put a book on your nightstand instead. Always have one too many with a friend who likes to drink? Shift your meet-up spot to a trailhead.

3. Add friction.

You can turn a negative behavior positive by making it a little tougher to carry out. To illustrate this, Wood points to a classic study published in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis . Researchers wanted to know what it would take for people to pick the stairs over the elevator in a four-story building, so they slowed the time it took for the elevator door to close by 16 seconds. This little bit of inconvenience, what experts call friction, cut elevator trips by one third. “The amazing thing?” says Wood. “Four weeks later, when they sped it back up, people kept taking the stairs — they’d formed a new stair-taking habit.” Get creative adding friction to patterns you want to change. Always biting your nails? Time for a manicure. Sit all day at your computer? Try a hard-backed desk chair that makes you want to frequently stand up. Creating even a tiny bit of resistance can block your automatic response, paving the way for progress.

4. Tune in…in real time.

The next time you’re procrastinating on a project or skimming the bottom of a jumbo bag of chips, pause and think about how you feel. “Ask yourself, ‘What am I getting from this?’” says Brewer. Simply being mindful of your actions can change the ingrained habit in your brain. Brewer’s team recently studied this with more than 1,000 patients who overate. After the patients really paid attention to how it felt to binge and repeated this exercise 10 to 15 times, their urge to overindulge began to fade, and they reported a significant reduction in craving-related eating. “As they started to see that the old behavior wasn’t helpful, the reward value dropped,” he says. “They became disenchanted with it.” The second mindful step to take, Brewer says, is thinking about how much better you feel when you don’t do your bad habit. “Our brain is always looking for a bigger, better offer, a ‘BBO,’” he explains. “So if you can focus on how unrewarding your old behavior is and how rewarding the new behavior is, your brain will naturally move in that direction.” Maybe your BBO is the great catch-up conversations you have with close friends during the time you would have been scrolling. Or the all-day high you feel when you actually go on a run in the morning versus skipping it and regretting it the rest of the day.

5. Have a backup plan.

For moments when progress backslides and you’re tempted to fall into your old, bad habit, create an “if/then” plan. For example, if you find yourself craving that afternoon soda, then you’ll crack open a can of seltzer. Having an exact strategy to steer yourself to a better option can help ensure it actually happens, especially when you’re first breaking a bad habit and it still has a bit of pull over you, says Wood. Breaking the trigger-behavior-reward cycle gets easier and easier the more you practice, says Wood. Keep repeating the steps above and busting your bad habits will soon become, well, a habit.

Words: Marissa Stephenson Illustration: Ryan Johnson

CHECK IT OUT

Kick your habit of sitting all day to the curb and replace it with some daily mobility work: The Yoga for Every Day program in the Nike Training Club app will get you feeling lighter and looser in no time. And treat yourself to some new yoga gear to keep your habit going strong.

Originally published: May 23, 2022

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How to Break a Bad Work Habit

W hat's your worst work habit? Do you regularly message your work BFF to moan about your boss? Were you late to a meeting more than once over the past week? Or do you miss meetings entirely because your inbox is so disorganized?

No one is perfect. We could all confess to at least one bad habit (or more) that's holding us back from doing our best work. As a career coach, I'm invested in helping my clients overcome these hurdles.

When you're building your career, striving to be on top of your game matters. But what happens if a bad work habit is forging the wrong kind of professional reputation? It's not too late to correct the course.

Here's how to break three common bad habits that can derail us the most.

1. Consistent Complaining

It's common to complain about work. According to the 2023 State of the Global Workplace report by Gallup, only 23 percent of employees found their work meaningful and felt connected to their team, manager and employer.

Considering the statistics, complaining about our careers might feel therapeutic at first. But if it becomes a habit, your constant complaints can leave a less-than-favorable impression on those who listen to you.

If you've fallen into this pattern and are concerned about cultivating an impression of perpetual negativity, it's time to make some changes. If you find yourself starting to complain about something or someone, here are three quick steps you can take:

• Take a deep breath
• Count slowly and silently to 10

Just taking a moment to recognize the behavior is powerful. Next, choose to find a way to work through the problem or issue instead of just complaining about it.

Say you had a bad meeting, a challenging day or a difficult conversation . Instead of venting to whoever will listen, be thankful that moment has passed. Reflect on what you learned from the experience, wipe a clean slate and start over.

Often, the things we complain about feel out of our control. For example, a demanding boss, a difficult client or an impossible deadline. If the trigger that's accelerating our stress levels can't be changed, take the responsibility to find a solution by changing your attitude.

You can take a huge step forward if you can find ways to process your feelings in new constructive ways. This can include practicing empathy or finding a solution.

Say your demanding boss has changed the parameters for your project on short notice. It might be helpful to consider the pressures from an important client that your supervisor is forced to respond to. This requires embracing a broader perspective on the situation versus an instinctive negative or defensive reaction in real time.

2. Out-of-Control Notifications

With email, work chat and constant meeting invites, organizing internal communications can often feel like Tetris. No matter how fast you respond, there's always more coming.

According to Microsoft 's 2023 Work Trend Index Annual Report , the weight of always-on communications is becoming increasingly challenging for workers to bear. Microsoft's findings illustrate how the inflow of data, emails, meetings and notifications is outpacing our ability to process it all, with 57 percent of time consumed with email, Teams chat and Teams meetings.

If you feel like you're drowning when you open your inbox, start by getting rid of any emails you no longer need. Delete what you can, archive any emails you no longer need, and unsubscribe from any newsletters that have become redundant.

At the start of each day, scan your inbox for urgent or important items and tackle those first, versus what's sitting right at the top and working down. If your inbox is heaving, you focus on what matters most. You don't want to leave an important or time-sensitive email unopened or unanswered for days.

If you're struggling to prioritize a deluge of Slack or chat app messages , briefly assess how your team and your supervisor prefer to communicate. Does Slack take priority over email for disseminating key information? Are Teams messages the default for informal interactions?

Next, allocate blocks of time at dedicated intervals to review messages and process emails, starting with the primary communication channel before switching to review the secondary channel. Treat your communication processing time slots as one of your priorities during your workday.

Creating a system for organizing your emails and processing your messages will help you work smarter and feel more in control.

3. Perpetual Procrastination

When your to-do list goes on for eternity, it's easy to feel overwhelmed. Instead of ignoring your growing to-do list , bite the bullet and develop a new system to get the things you really don't enjoy out of the way fast.

First, carefully evaluate how critical each item on your to-do list is. Is it a "must do right now" task, a "need to do this week" task or a "want to do soon" task?

Label the urgency and then schedule the time to complete it based on the urgency. Keep your daily to-do list short and focused on the key tasks that really matter.

Next, get the task you've been dreading out of the way at the start of the day. Set a time limit and stick to it. Working to beat the clock can be a great motivator to get a task done.

Remove any distractions so you can focus on what you need to do and get it tackled faster. If it helps, create a personal incentive as a reward for finally getting the job done such as taking a 15-minute walk or refueling with your favorite healthy snack.

People who procrastinate are often perfectionists. They can struggle with starting or completing a task because they want it to go perfectly. Others leave important things to the last minute because they choose to harness the adrenaline rush of working under pressure.

But if you have a boss, a client, a team or direct reports who look to you to complete deliverables, your procrastination will start impacting others who are part of the process. Embracing new task management habits will enable you to complete tasks on schedule.

Addressing Your Bad Work Habits

If you've decided to address a bad work habit but are finding it hard to stay on track, it can help to examine the consequences. In The Better Habits Workbook , psychotherapist and author Stephanie Sorady explains how to overcome the mental barriers that can make it hard to break certain habits.

When you find yourself repeating habits that have negative consequences, Sorady suggests consciously examining the long-term ramifications.

Ask yourself, if you continue this habit, how will it impact your career over the next few years? Then, take that one step further and consider: if you were to eliminate this habit, what is the potential impact?

If you're wrestling with a bad work habit, consider its potential as a "before and after" success story. The people who command the most respect are the individuals who recognize their challenges and endeavor to address them. Reconfiguring how you approach your work takes committed effort, but it's worth the investment.

About the Author

An award-winning career coach at Twenty Ten Agency , author of Prep, Push, Pivot , and host of the Audible Original series How to Change Careers with Octavia Goredema . You can learn more about Octavia's work at octaviagoredema.com .

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