Habit Stacking: 127 Small Actions That Take Five Minutes or Less

by S.J. Scott

most people can only retain seven chunks of information. Since a tiny fraction of what you know is stored in your “working memory,” you have to rely on long-term memory and existing habits to accomplish almost every task in life.

Here’s the essence of a habit stacking routine: You identify the small actions that relate to a goal or an important desired outcome.

Next, you put these habits into a step-by-step routine that’s completed in a logical sequence.

Finally, you use proven psychological strategies to make this routine “sticky” ...

The Compound Effect, author Darren Hardy explains

“Small, Smart Choices + Consistency + Time = RADICAL DIFFERENCE”

Why lemon? Because it promotes hydration, is a good source of vitamin C, and supports weight loss.

“broken windows theory,” as discussed in Malcolm Gladwell’s book The Tipping Point, which referenced an article published by social scientists James Wilson and George Kelling in 1982.

Writing helps me clear my mind (spirituality), generate income (career), and reduce stress (health). So I prefer to start the day with this habit because I can harness the energetic state generated from the habit stacking routine and then use it to start my most important task with a bang!

The point here is that when you complete a habit stacking routine, you can build “emotional momentum” that has a positive spillover effect on your next few actions. My advice is to pick the one keystone habit that has the biggest impact on your life.

The simplest way to remember a stack is to do it right before or after a habit.

If-then plans (also known as implementation intentions) can help you stick with a goal and, more importantly, will prevent those times when you want to skip a day.

identify an existing habit then create a plan for the specific action you’ll complete immediately before or after this routine.

“I will start my habit stacking routine right after I walk into the living room first thing in the morning.”

each if-then plan is attached to an existing behavior.

once you create an if-then plan, all you need to do is add a reminder to make sure it’s completed.

Complete each habit in five minutes or l...

Each small habit should be a complete action.

There should be an obvious starting and stopping point. In other words, you should avoid habits where you could easily do more of it if you had time (like exercising, writing, or anything related to your job).

For instance, there isn’t a lot of value in cramming five minutes of exercise into a stack because it won’t give you the full benefit of improved fitness and strength. Instead, a better use of your time is to pack your gym bag for the day or record a workout from the day before. Each action supports your larger keystone habits and has a clear starting and stopping point.

major exception to this rule. You could add the occasional “elephant habit” to your daily stack to make forward progress on an unpleasant task. By chipping away at this project in small five- to ten-minute increments, you won’t procrastinate on the tasks that you know need to get done but aren’t very fun.

Each small action should be easy to complete without requiring a lot of brainpower.

each activity should only require a single step, or maybe two steps, to complete.

Mini Habits by Stephen Guise.

The core idea is to set a simple goal that overcomes inertia. Then usually, once you get started, you’ll do more of the task then you originally planned.

These are the small wins that will build “emotional momentum” because they’re easy to remember and complete.

small wins, I mean actions that require little willpower, like taking a vitamin, weighing yourself, filling a thirty-two-ounce bottle of water,

Every stack should be anchored to a trigger related to a location, time of day, or combination of both.

My definition of a trigger is a cue that uses one of your five senses (sight, sound, smell, touch, or taste), which acts as a reminder to complete a specific action.

a trigger can push you into taking action.

There are two basic types of triggers. The first are external triggers (like a cell phone alarm, a push notification, or a Post-it note on your refrigerator). External triggers work because they create a Pavlovian response that when the alarm goes off, you complete a specific task.

The second type are internal triggers, which are the feelings, thoughts, and emotions that you relate to an established habit. These are like a scratch that you must itch.

Charles Duhigg discusses in the book The Power of Habit,

Hooked by Nir Eyal,

A trigger should be an existing habit. This is an action you do automatically every day,

match the trigger to the first habit of the routine.

law of inertia (also known as Newton’s First Law of Motion). If not, the law states that “an object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.”

if your natural tendency is to lounge around before starting the day, then you’ll need an extra “push” to force you into action.

People often fail at building habits because it’s easier to stay resting than it is to do something n...

It’s not enough to make a personal commitment. The big things in life require a solid action plan and a support network to tap into whenever you encounter an obstacle.

There are a variety of ways to be accountable, like posting your progress on social media accounts, telling the people in your life about your new routine, or even “punishing” yourself for not staying committed to a goal by using an app like Beeminder.

Giving yourself a reward can be a great motivator to complete a daily routine.

avoid any reward that eliminates the benefit of a specific habit.

Consistency is more important than anything else. Repetition builds muscle memory.

All that said, it’s not the end of the world if you miss the occasional day. It happens to the best of us.

But you must never, ever miss two days in a row. This will create a slippery slope where it’ll become progressively easier to miss future days.

The key here is to never miss a day, even if you’re not in the mood. (Sounds

never break the chain.

Marking X’s on a calendar encourages you to complete your desired task every single day. The more you look at an unbroken string of red X’s, the more compulsion you’ll feel to get over any initial resistance and force yourself to get started.

The purpose of not breaking the chain is to elimin...