You have to truly stop putting yourself in vulnerable positions. Most of us put ourselves in vulnerable positions and then we freak out as to why we don't have enough willpower. You're relying so much on willpower when you've been attracted or addicted or attached to that thing, whatever it is, for so long, that you're actually stressing yourself out. You're actually creating more fatigue in your mind and body by trying to resist something that you're putting so close. Hey, hey, hey, everyone,
welcome back to On Purpose. I am so excited for today's session. It has been amazing to see the love that you've been showing the podcast over the first few weeks of the year. It's been incredible to see the engagement, to see how many of you are listening, to see what you're taking away. I am truly truly blown away by your dedication and commitment to the podcast. I could sit here and read reviews all day, and I just want you to know that I appreciate them. They mean
the world to me. Please keep leaving your name at the end of them so that I can shout you out in these episodes as well. And I am so excited to be talking to you today. I can't believe it. My new book, Eight Rules of Love is out and I cannot wait to share it with you. I am so so excited for you to read this book, for you to listen to this book. I read the audiobook. If you haven't got it already, make sure you go
to eight Rules of Love dot com. It's dedicated to anyone who's trying to find, keep, or let go of love. So if you've got friends that are dating, broken up, or struggling with love, make sure you grab this book. And I'd love to invite you to come and see me for my global tour Love Rules. Go to Ja shettytour dot com to learn more information about tickets, VIP experiences and more. I can't wait to see you this year. But today I want to talk to you about how
do we break habits? How do we end habits that we no longer need, that no longer serve us in our life. We all have things in our life that we've been doing for a long long time. We have things that have been in our life maybe for a year. We have some things that have been in our lives for a decade, and then there are other things that are maybe crept in in the last few months. But how do you let go of a bad habit you
no longer need and no longer serves you. The first thing I'm about to say might surprise you, but it's a really, really interesting thing. The first step to letting go of a bad habit is realizing that it did serve you at one point for a mindset that you currently have. Let me give you an example. Maybe I'm eating unhealthy pathetically speaking, when I realized that at one point that served my mindset, I didn't care about my health.
I didn't mind that I was unhealthy, I didn't mind that I was damaging my health, and that served that mindset. Let me accept it rather than just making it negative and toxic and trying to push it away. And you know, when you're pushing something, you're still holding onto it. Right, If you're having to push something away, your hand is still on it, It is still connected to you. Whereas when you just open your hand and you let it
fall out, you gracefully and gently let it go. And I find this really fascinating that when we don't want something, we almost want to push it, force it out of our lives. We don't know how to just gently open up and let go. And the way you do that with a habit is you accept this served a mindset that I once had. You accept that this did serve me at one point in time. It no longer serves me. It's not useless, it's not the worst. It's something you hate,
it's not something you dislike. It's something that no longer serves you. There's a beautiful verse in the Bulga Geta. This is the book that I reference a lot and think like a monk, and a book that I study during my time as a monk, and it talks about how attachment and aversion are two sides of the same coin. And this is a really, really fascinating concept that when we're attached to something. When you loved eating unhealthy, the natural change now is you now present yourself as being
averse to it. You want to hate it, you want to push it away, but that is still an attachment. It still keeps you connected to that idea, it still keeps you in touching distance, it still keeps it in your hand. So first accept this no longer serves me. I'm letting it go. When you want to break a habit, the first thing you have to accept is that this did serve me. It no longer serves me. And I'm letting it go. I'm not forcing it away, I'm not
pushing it away. I'm not trying to break it. Even that language that we use, I have to break this habit. We don't have to break it. We have to just let it go. We have to just move on. We have to let it naturally devolve and dissolve from our life. We don't want to break it in the process. And I was having a really beautiful conversation with a friend this morning, and we were talking about how when you do things in an intentional way, even when you sever
something or cut something, it actually brings you closer. I had to have a really difficult conversation with a team member recently and I had to share with them some
of their performance that I wasn't happy with. But because I also want to help people find their potential and live their purpose and perform at a high level, and also love humans and want people to feel good and feel happy, I tried my best to notice something in them that I believed was unique and their greatest gift So whilst I was giving them honest, transparent feedback, I also wanted to notice the greatness that they have within them, and I was inspired to share that with them as well.
And even though I'd have to give them all of this tough feedback, we actually became closer through that conversation. Now, that's remarkable that you could actually break something or end something in a way that it may seem but it actually has a new beginning. And that's how spiritual intentions work. That's the power of living an intentional, conscious life that even when you are cutting a bad habit, you're actually creating a positive relationship with yourself and creating a better
relationship with that habit. Often the reason why we swing and pendulum between attachment and aversion is because we never truly let go and disconnect. We go from being attached to something to being averse to it, to hating it, and then we pendulum back to loving it. But if we just opened our hand and let it go because it didn't serve us anymore, we actually have a healthier
relationship with it. So attachment and a version are not healthy relationships because you just constantly oscillate back and forth between them. We're actually trying to go beyond attachment and aversion. We're going to acceptance. I accept this served me. It doesn't serve me anymore. I'm letting it go now. The second principle to breaking, we're going to be changing that word to letting go of bad habits is to realize
what's motivating you. How many times if you try to break a habit or lose a bad habit, but then it comes right back that attachment and a version that we all experience. There are four things that motivate us. Let's choose the eating unhealthy again. One of the reasons could be fear. You fear being unhealthy, or you fear that people will see you as unhealthy, or you fear that it may affect your career and your family and your children. Fear is one motivator. The one to higher
from fear is results. You're motivated by getting a particular result. I want a revenge body, I want that person to feel this way about me. I want to get to this goal because I want to prove something. That intention is better than being motivated by fear, but it is still misleading and not the healthiest. Higher than that is the motivator or intention of duty. You do something out of responsibility and duty that I want to eat healthier
because I want to be responsible about my body. I want to be responsible about my family and my children. It's a feeling of responsibility. Now, it's not fear that's motivating you. That's considered a healthier, progressive intention. Now. The fourth motivator that is considered the motivator that is the most profound and powerful, is when we're motivated by love and purpose. We love our body, so we want to take care of it. We love our family, so we
want to take care of it. We love food, so we want to honor it and nourish it and eat it in a way that it's good for us. We want to create more experiences of love. Isn't that where we all want to live? But here's the thing. We have to move up the ladder. If something's not been changing for a long time, if you haven't been able to break a habit for a long time, chances are you haven't dialed up the fear enough. You're not really scared of how bad this could be. I realize I
love fried food. Who doesn't love fries? Fried vegan wings? Like, who doesn't love something fried? But when I started to really understand how damaging fried food was for me, I interviewed Dave Aspury, it was on my podcast. We talked about this, even doctor Stephen Gundry. When I talk to them about fried food, you start to recognize, Okay, fear is actually going to help me get away from this because I love myself, but I've feared that more so, fear is often the first step. Then from that you
now set a goal. You say, Okay, now I want to result. I want to try and not eat fried food because I'm going to try and be healthier. My result is that I'm going to be healthy. Okay, Now I'm doing it responsibly just because it become a natural pattern, and now I'm doing it out of love. So often we stay in fear or we try to do it because of love, and we fail because if you stay in fear, it's not sustainable, and if you try and jump to love, it's not sustainable because we're not there yet.
So use fear as the first intention, but then rise to the intention of result, rise to the intention of responsibility, and then rise to the intention of Step number three is know every single trigger. Imagine you were an FBI agent or you're a double O agent. You would be trained to be aware of every potential point of weakness and attack. If you don't know every one of your weaknesses, chances are someone else will. One of your greatest strengths
is an awareness of all your weaknesses. We think knowing about our weaknesses makes us weaker, but that's not true. Awareness of your weaknesses can be your greatest strength because when you're aware of all your triggers, guess what you're prepared. You know how many times did you play a little video game when you jump with Mario from place to place, tube to tube and coin to coin, and you start knowing, Okay, that's a trigger there. I know that that animal thing
is going to try and eat me. I know I'm going to fall through that gap. When you're aware of the triggers, you can play the game. If you're not aware of the triggers, you're going to be surprised every single time Sonic the Headgehog. Okay, now I'm showing my age, but you take any video game if you're not aware of where the trigger might be, it's going to be really tough. I want you to know every single trigger. So for me, one of my triggers is being hungry
while I'm out in the studio. If I get hungry while I'm at the studio, I'm going to turn to a bag of chips that's there, or I'm going to turn to a sugar rich energy bar that isn't really as full of protein as you want it to be. So I know that's a trigger for me. I've literally started carrying around with me a box of nuts and dates. I've started carrying around with me healthier snacks that I can have throughout the day. I have to know that trigger though it's such a specific trigger and it's not
something that's in my house. But that's why I have to be aware of it, because I can see that that's where I always fall back into my old habits. What's another place that I fall back into my old habits? Maybe when I'm with a certain group of people, Maybe when I go to a certain space for dinner, a certain place for dinner. Maybe when I'm tired. I know that when I'm tired, I want to eat much more carbs, sugar, and the things that aren't great for me. Are you
aware of every single trigger. I want you to write down every single trigger possible. Do not leave any stone unturned in this activity. This is actually the reason why we keep failing and keep messing up because we haven't made a list of every possible, single trigger. I really mean it, every single one. You're not going to miss a single one. I want every single trigger. The forward step is removed, the triggers that don't need to be in close proximity. I've always joked about this. I call
it the world's worst snack drawer. It's the snack drawer we have in our house. Rather has removed all unhealthy items from the snack drawer. It's only full of healthy items, which I actually enjoy Now. It's taken me a while, but I call it the world's worst snack drawer, and the removal of those triggers from my space has forced me to healthier habits. I'll pick a fruit instead of a bad snack. I'll pick a healthy snack instead of an unhealthy snack. I'll pick a walk instead of a
snack at all. Right, I realized walking to that drawer and not wanting anything from it is sometimes what makes the healthiest choice. We have to remove the triggers from our close proximity. What are the distractions? What are the things? I had a friend who was addicted to pornography, and the only way that he could work on that is he had to ban every site from his phone. He had to ban every site from his laptop, He had to sleep away from his laptop, he had to keep
his phone in another room. Like he really wanted to break that habit. You really wanted to let go of that habit, And the only way to let go of it was to not keep the triggers so close. He had to mute a bunch of people that he followed on Instagram. Right, And so are you truly giving yourself the best chance? Most of us are setting ourselves up for failure by still putting ourselves in vulnerable positions. And
that's the interesting thing about this. It's that if you really want to let go of this habit, you have to truly stop putting yourself in vulnerable positions. Most of us put ourselves in vulnerable positions, and then we freak out as to why we don't have enough willpower. You're relying so much on willpower when you've been a tracked it or addicted or attached to that thing, whatever it is,
for so long that you're actually stressing yourself out. You're actually creating more fatigue in your mind and body by trying to resist something that you're putting so close. Step number five. Create a system for each trigger you can't remove. This is called an if then system. If I'm at the studio, then I take dates and nuts with me. If I am hungry at a gas station, I know, then these are the bars that I can choose from.
If I am at the airport and I forgot to pack a meal, then this is what I would turn to. Until you create an if then plan for each and every one of your triggers, you're basically saying, I'll decide in the moment, and in the moment, you're always going to go to your default conditioned state. In the moment, it's very difficult to shrug off and shake off your conditioning. It's really really difficult, and you're creating more stress, pressure, attention for your mind and body to go through in
that moment. If I miss my alarm, then what am I going to do? How are you going to change that? If I don't feel like waking up in the morning, then I'm going to have the alarm be my favorite song so I wake up. The idea is creating that if then system sets you up for success rather than creating this surprise moment. If you don't create an if then system, you're basically living a life full of surprises.
And if you live a life full of surprises, you are always going to end up living the same life because when you're surprised, you go back to your old ways. Step number six. This is something that I learned from my friends who've been a part of AA, and it's having someone you call just when you're about to mess up.
So you have someone in your life that you call or message when you're about to mess up, you're about to do something you don't want to do, when you've promised you're going to break this habit, you have someone you call up now. This person doesn't have to be
working on the same thing. They might have already worked through it, which is really really useful in that case, or in the simpler sense, it's just a friend that you trust that isn't going to mind getting a message saying hey, I need some help, just need some reassurance, you know, stay with me. Promise me that you're not going to let me do this right. That kind of person is so helpful because what we really need is
pattern interruption. So if I feel tired, I'm naturally going to turn to a carbi sugary item, and if I have someone to call. What it does is it disrupts the pattern that I need this thing in my life right now. You get to walk it through, talk it through, you message someone, you break it down. It gives you that space. Having someone to call in those emergency, urgent moments can be truly, truly powerful. The seventh step is something that the Vedic perspective talks about a lot, and
it's finding resplacements, having a higher taste. This is something we forget to do. You can't let go of something without replacing it with something, and this is probably the biggest mistake in all of our habit structuring. You can't remove something without replacing it. Please do not just try to remove something from your life, replace it with something better. In the vading perspective, this is called the higher taste. You only let go of a lower taste when you
have a higher taste. So I was reading on healthline about how long it takes to really break a habit, and I think this is some really important and interesting information. So research from twenty twelve looking at habit formation suggests ten weeks or about two point five months is a more realistic estimate for more people. The main evidence back time frame for habit breaking comes from two thousand and nine research, which suggests it can take anywhere from eighteen
to two hundred and fifty four days. This study looked at ninety six adults who wanted to change one specific behavior. One person formed a new habit in just eighteen days, but the other participants needed more time. It took an average of sixty six days for the new behavior to become automatic, according to study results. So you can try to understand that habit formation is not something quick and fast and easy. It's going to take time and breaking
a habit down as well. So when we say, okay, well in twenty twenty two, I'm not going to do something, that's actually not a good plan. Because when you say well, in twenty twenty two, I'm not going to do something, you're basically trying to go from one hundred to a zero and that doesn't work. So you may say in twenty twenty two. I'm trying to go from one hundred to ninety right, I'm trying to reduce it. I'm trying to break this part of it down. I'm trying to
understand stand what my motivators are. I'm trying to really understand my triggers. In January and in February, I'm going to work on an if then plan for my triggers. It's a step by step process that I want people to take. So I really hope that you're going to try and implement this in your life this week. Thank you so much for listening to on Purpose. I am so so grateful to each and every one of you, and I'm going to read some of your amazing reviews.
This one is from Simone Carter Amazing Podcast. I've heard great things about this podcast, so when I recently did a cross country trip, I downloaded all of the episodes and played it NonStop. The topics, guests and information Jay provides through his platform is amazing. Every episode gave me applicable advice to improve, opportunities to reflect, and ways to
get in tune with myself and my values. I was in the middle of a big life transition, and this podcast helped me feel prepared to take on the challenges that came with it because of our genuine and vulnerable Jay years. With every podcast, I feel like I'm talking with a good friend. I cannot recommend this podcast enough. Wow. That is amazing. I am so so grateful. I really
really appreciate this. This is from Marie B. After listening to this podcast for a little over a year now, I would absolutely recommend Jay's just so incredible explaining and breaking down useful information. You're so kind after each episode, you instantly can feel better, adjust your perspective, and have helpful information to use in your daily life. He also does an amazing job at inviting guests who truly have so much to offer and make an hour long podcast
so easy to listen to. Thank you. Wow, these are incredible. I'm just so touched. Honestly, I'm so humbled that I get to have this connection and relationship with you and keep these reviews coming. And please do leave your name so that I can shout you out in the episode as well. This is from Tania Beauty, Positivity and Abundance. Dear j, thank you for an amazing podcast. I'm a new listener, and I look so forward to your uploads.
You bring beauty, positivity, and abundance to the world, and all of your listeners are grateful for your messages and your genuine spirit. Thank you, Tanny, and thanks for eaching every one of you. I'll see you again. Next to Meek