Can’t Seem to Stick With Your Commitments? Try Making a Pact
You’ve surely heard the protest chant:
“What do we want? [Insert social change here.] When do we want it? NOW!”
But imagine walking by a protest and hearing this:
“What do we want? We’re not really sure!”
“When do we want it? Whenever you get around to it is fine! Thank you!”
Doesn’t have the same ring to it.
And yet that’s closer to how we talk to ourselves when we’re trying to make a change to our habits or routines. We say to others, “Do it or else!” But we say to ourselves, “Give it a try sometime, or not. Do whatever you feel like!” Through my research for my book Indistractable, I’ve found that by understanding what facilitates social change, we can finally inspire personal change. Here are three lessons.
Precommit to change
For more than two years, Rose Lounsbury, a mother of 11-year-old triplets, had been trying to finish her book. But again and again, she found herself procrastinating. So Rose made a pact.
A pact is a precommitment to an outcome that acts as a firewall against distraction. You can think of it as a sort of “habit bet.”
