Here is a series of short tips to help those of you who are struggling with regularity in your beauty routine. And it's not just about skin and hair care: most of these tips can be applied to taking baby steps in taking yourself in other ways -- makeup, clothes, even working out.
Tip #2: Link Your New Beauty Habit With An Existing Event
One of the best ways to make a new habit stick is to link it with an existing habit. Pick something that you want to be doing, and decide to do it before / after something you already do every day. For example hand cream + brushing your teeth in the evening. You can even put your hand cream next to your toothbrush for the first week or two as a visual reminder. Very soon you won't need to, brushing your teeth will trigger your memory.
I am not really sure why attaching new habits to existing habits works, but my theory is that this anchors the new habit to a specific place and time.
When we plan to do a new action we usually forget to specify the where and when, and this makes us more likely to not do it.
You can create daily or weekly habits this way. Just be sure that the associations you are building are pleasant ones (or at least neutral) -- you are more likely to stick something that's connected to your morning coffee than to cleaning out the dog's litter.
I started using this tip when I was sick and kept on forgetting to take my medicine, so I started keeping the pills next to my water cup. Now I keep my hand cream and my under-eye cream next to my sleep mask.
Let me know if this works for you of if it has worked in the past. What old habit did your new habit piggyback on?
I am not really sure why attaching new habits to existing habits works, but my theory is that this anchors the new habit to a specific place and time.
When we plan to do a new action we usually forget to specify the where and when, and this makes us more likely to not do it.
You can create daily or weekly habits this way. Just be sure that the associations you are building are pleasant ones (or at least neutral) -- you are more likely to stick something that's connected to your morning coffee than to cleaning out the dog's litter.
I started using this tip when I was sick and kept on forgetting to take my medicine, so I started keeping the pills next to my water cup. Now I keep my hand cream and my under-eye cream next to my sleep mask.
Let me know if this works for you of if it has worked in the past. What old habit did your new habit piggyback on?
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