Quitting Coffee – How to Successfully Replace a Habit

At the core of building one’s success rests the simple truth that many of us need to change and improve our way of thinking. All the great success architects talk of how we need to change our environment, how we need to keep our goals first and forefront, how we need to take each moment in everyday to remember and remind ourselves to take the next step towards our passion and purpose in life.
Many of those who I’ve spoken to are challenged by their first step in this process. Or their challenge is in maintaining the stamina needed to persevere.
This daily “first step” can be overwhelming in the beginning. But this overwhelming feeling is also a great chance to build this change into a daily habit, and use it to replace an old, less desirable, habit.

I’ve been on the success track for a while now, and sometimes it is hard to relate and to connect with those who are just starting out on their road to success. That changed today. As I had a very humbling experience; Today is the first day I proposed to have a fast on coffee. I enjoy it too much to quit parse, but I will go without it for an entire month. The first greeting that rewarded my efforts arrived as the typical caffeine withdrawal headache. Wow, it was intense. It reminded me of the reactions we receive when we start on the road to success from our bodies, minds, the people that surround us and the people that support us.
It fascinates me how the human mind and body work. If you get too use to something, (no matter how good or bad it is) it is very difficult and many times both mentally and physically painful to stop. From my studies I’ve seen that it’s a statistically proven fact that it takes about a month to quit (or more technically “replace”) a habit and somewhere around a year to make life long change.

Many people center in on the habit itself (I just need to not drink coffee today), when really what they need to be aware of is the deeply rooted conditioning that is supporting the habit (every morning I go to starbucks, I love the atmosphere, the community, the warmth, the music, the somewhat upscale atmosphere, etc.) and the reasoning behind the habit itself (I love the warmth of a hot drink in the morning, something that wakes me up and soothes me at the same time).

Conditioning plays a huge factor in all our lives. More so than most of us realize. And just as any habit you wish to quit needs to be both removed and replaced – conditioning requires a different condition or environment.
Let’s recap:
Surviving the Caffeine Headache
Think of a habit you want to remove. Think of what state of mind you’re in when you enter the desire for this thing or action that supports your habit. How can you change that mindset? What about the environment? Is there a certain place, maybe in your home or at work that you tend to revert to this old habit? How can you change your environment to support not being able to continue this habit?
Remind yourself, what positive habit have you thought up to replace this bad habit?
For me; I’m replacing coffee in the morning with machine blended organic fruit and organic matcha.
From there, it’s just enduring the change for a month. Which will be hard. But worth it.

If you’re trying to quit coffee... don’t hang out at Starbucks!
Tim Ferriss quotes AA meeting advice, “if you don’t want to slip – don’t go where it’s slippery”. Apply this to your habit. E-mailing too much at home? Stop sitting at your computer every night… or at least vow not to open outlook.
I will cut the café out of my morning routine, and make the morning lifestyle within my home more desirable. Yoga/Tai chi after waking up, something refreshing to read while I eat/drink breakfast, and then some more time to blog before heading off to work. Remember the new habit has to be more exciting or fulfilling than the old one.

Use your community to help you and support your decision.
My beautifully amazing girlfriend just went out of town for a month. I set my deadline and promised her that I would keep to it. It helps to share your plans with friends, coworkers and loved ones. The accountability makes it much harder to easily break and return to your old ways.

Always make sure to set a goal, quantifying it with a date and qualifying it with a strong reward.
April 24th says I can have another cup of coffee. Until then… it’s Lock Down!
Upon completion, I get to ask my girl on a coffee date over the weekend.
Set your goals, set dates, quantify them, be realistic yet aggressive, and remember to heavily reward yourself!

With a little bit of time, some information and a dash of passion – you can accomplish anything in life! What are you waiting for?

Moments of Inspiration

Last night was amazing.

We have them. Moments of inspiration. Friends, family, loved ones. A long conversation, a nice dinner, sharing intimate moments. Amazing subtle experiences. Set alone, they may be enlightening. But strung into the thread of fate and melded into your day to day – they become epiphanies. Strong enough to empower you to do great things!

Moments of inspiration are tools of momentum. When was your last moment of inspiration? What were you doing? Who were you with? What was your state of mind? Exploring further and writing these things down means that you will be able to call upon these experiences and memories later when you are in need of injecting passion into your flow. Take a moment today and explore how to bring more moments of inspiration into your life… and how you can share them with others.