- Ben Banbury
How To Create Habits That Actually Stick
Creating daily habits to live a healthier lifestyle can be tricky - but I've got a technique using just your smartphone that's guaranteed to start changing your life

Before getting stuck into this post, make sure you read yesterdays post about How to destroy bad habits
What Good Habits Mean To Your Health
Eating high amounts of fruit, veg and protein, drinking plenty of water, exercising regularly and getting 8 hours of sleep are all habits
You brush your teeth twice a day right? That's a habit
Now image if you forgot to brush your teeth before work tomorrow
Apart from feeling self conscious about your bed-breath, it would also feel really weird right?
That's because the habit of you brushing your teeth has been so heavily ingrained into your daily routine
So let's make exercise and healthy eating a habit
How I Create New Habits
Before you continue reading it's really important to me that you understand the method I teach you next involves you putting in the leg work
You must hold yourself accountable for your actions and your results
If you do, I can 100% promise you that this technique will change everything for you
Step 1: Decide what habits you want to introduce
I can help here. If you've just started getting into exercise and healthy eating, or perhaps you haven't picked up these habits, I'd highly recommend you start here;
Drink 2L of water
Eat 5 vegetables and 1-2 fruit portions
Move for at least 20 minutes a day
Perform some form of resistance work 3 x week for 28 minutes
Aim to eat protein with every meal
I'd pick 1-2 and then add an extra habit a week
Obviously if you're more advanced you could be more specific and your habits could be things like:
Eat 2g of protein per KG of body weight
Track everything in MyFitnessPal
Run for 10k a week
I mean, they could literally be anything, There your goals not mine
Step 2: Add your habits to a reminder app on your phone
We all use smartphones right? We're never really that far from it
So add your new habit into your phone
This is what mine currently looks like

But I also use "Reminders" as I'm an Iphone user (as should you!)
The most important part of this technique is to add a time and a notification to the set habit
Every morning I get a silent notification popup on my phone
In this case it just reads "Morning" and lists my 4 habits pictured above
When I use Apples reminder app I just get a notification saying "Take vitamins" or whatever it is
Conclusion - Why It Works
As I mentioned before, this technique will completely change your life for the better. As long as you hold yourself accountable and don't just ignore the notifications haha
I read that it takes about 66 days to create a long lasting habit
So by being reminded every single day to complete that task you're rewiring your brain to create a habit
The goal is in 66 days that you can happily delete the notification, safely knowing that your set habit has stuck
Then you can think about adding your next one!
If you're looking at setting healthy habits I've put together a very basic guide to getting started. It's completely Free and yours to download if you think it will help
Free 7-Day Fat Loss Guide
(It's also worth me mentioning that I use this same technique with my business to remind myself to check in with clients, to write this blog or whatever)
Have a good one!
Ben