Be Your Best

Todd Gifford – Success Coach

For this Thanksgiving time of year edition, I thought I would touch on a simple, but very useful skill involving ‘giving thanks’ that can make you more likable, allow you to get more accomplished, and advance you in your company or with your family and friends.  It’s so simple that it almost seems too easy for it to create remarkable results.  How many times during the day do you interact with someone and you disagree with their idea even just a little bit (co-worker, boss, husband, etc…)?  This happens a lot to all of us on a daily, even hourly basis.  Our natural instinct is to push back a little or a lot depending on the circumstance, and convey our opinion, ideas, or position on the topic.

“Thank You.”
What do you think would happen if you simply said ‘thank you’ whenever someone is telling you their idea about anything that you may disagree with either a little or even a lot.  Normally you would say something like: “That’s a good idea, but I think…”.  You would instead say: ‘Thank you for that idea.’  No mention of anything about your actual opinion.  What would happen?

I can tell you what will happen from personal experience, although I am still working at getting this simple ‘thank you’ approach dialed into a habit.  People will simply like you more.  The reason is that everyone likes other people to accept and value their ideas and opinions.  Right?  It is pretty straightforward.  However, people rarely do accept our ideas and opinions fully, 100% — they typically counter them to some or a large degree, and say ‘great idea, but…’  There is always that ‘but’ or ‘however’ in there, which creates friction.  Think about how you will be perceived if you just say ‘Thank you’, period.  Wow!
Eliminating Wasted Time and Making People Feel Better at the same time

Think of all the time wasted arguing or debating ideas and opinions, that can be avoided by simply saying ‘thank you’ or ‘thank you, I had not thought of that’ and moving on.  The beauty in this is that people will begin to see you as someone who is agreeable, approachable, and welcoming.  The irony is that you will ‘get your way’ more often because of this.  Instead of countering an idea with your better idea, you thank them for their idea.  Done.  Then, after some time has passed and if you have a different point of view, you can see what they think of your idea, but it is not viewed as a ‘but’ or ‘however’.  Try it for a week or two and see what happens.

The Concept of Habit ‘Linking’

Instituting change in your work or personal habits is extremely difficult.  Your habits and routines are engrained in your life.  Often, change is required to grow and develop, and many times change is critical to improving health, work results, or relationships.  I spend a fair bit of time working on new habits and changing old ones, in order to improve and develop.  One method I have found to be very effective in successfully adopting a new habit or routine of any kind, or replacing an old one, is what I call ‘Habit Linking’.  Essentially, Habit Linking is accomplished by finding an existing habit that you have, and ‘attaching’ or ‘linking’ a new habit directly to it.  To replace an old habit, you can use Habit Linking by indentifying a good habit that is already linked to the habit you want to replace, and then link your new habit in place of the old habit.  The key is that the existing habit is in place and happens consistently.

Example of Habit Linking in Practice
Let’s say you want to add the habit of walking 30 minutes into your daily routine.  Using Habit Linking, you would identify a highly synergistic existing habit that you could ‘attach’ the new habit of walking to.  In the morning, your current routine may involve getting something to drink, then eating something, reading the paper or watching the news, and then showering, brushing your teeth, and so on.  Walking would make sense right after you eat, because fueling up with some calories is a good idea prior to exercise.  As long as you have the habit of eating every morning in place, you can ‘trigger’ yourself to go for the walk based on the eating habit.  You may have to watch or listen to the news while you walk, but ‘eating’ will link to ‘walking’.  As weird as it sounds, it is a good idea to write down your routine steps, and document the new habit in the sequence.

According to most experts, it takes between 21 and 30 days to install a new habit and make it ‘habitual’.  I believe using Habit Linking makes this process much easier.  Better yet, Habit Linking allows me to successfully get the new habit installed permanently.

Why does Habit Linking work?
Two main reasons.  One is that you can set yourself up to be reminded of the new habit from the habit you are linking to in that 21 day startup period (ie. In the walking example above, you could put a reminder note on/in the Refrigerator or food cabinet that says ‘walk for 30 minutes’).  This may seem a little over the top, but it works.  Never underestimate the task of installing a new habit.  Second, you can create an ‘anchor’ in your brain which essentially is a psychological link between the existing habit and the new one.  Your brain automatically starts to think of walking when you are eating after doing it for a while.

Putting ‘Thank you’ and Habit Linking together, I am working on linking the habit of just saying “Great idea, thank you” with no ‘but’ after someone tells me their idea!

Be Your Best,
Todd D. Gifford