I have a liking to putting pressure on the hyponychium part of my nails. It’s the skin under the free edge of our nails which is full of nerve endings. It all started when I was a kid. I got a teddy bear and it had some sort of manufacturing defect which made it have a tiny bump under the throat. It was tiny enough that I could put it under my nail and press my hyponychium. The peak feeling of pleasure would be if I cut my nails short and press on them. That kind of feeling was so good and I just cant seem to stop. The only drawback is that I am prone to getting nail fungus. Nevertheless I still do it everyday most of the times. I just cant seem to stop. Does anyone here have a similar/same habit?

I've been trying to build habits for a long time.

Every time I'd get motivated,last a few days, maybe a week, then slowly stop. I probably restarted the same challenge 20+ times.

At the beginning of this year I made one simple goal: do all of my habits for 30 days straight. That's literally 1/12 of the year. It didn't sound that crazy, but it is almost 10% of the year!!! not wasted.

The thing that finally worked WAS NOT another productivity app or some motivational video.

I made a deal with a friend. If I didn't make it to 30 days, I'd owe him $100.

That changed everything. I've started to grind like crazy xd, created 7 alarms. (before it was very hard to wake up at 6/7am.)

Around day 10 I went on a trip with friends. We stayed up late every night. Next day I knew I had to wake up around 6 AM, but I was still lying in bed at 2 AM listening to a podcast because it was one of my daily habits and I refused to break the streak.

Was it stupid? Maybe.

Was it hard? Definitely, 100%

But I made it through.

Today I'm on day 18, and something weird has happened. Doing all 16 of my daily habits doesn't feel like this huge battle anymore. It just feels.. normal. I don't spend all day arguing with myself. I just do them.

The biggest lesson for me wasn't "be more disciplined."

It was finding a reason that actually hurts if you quit.

If you're struggling, I'd suggest asking yourself WHY you're doing your habits in the first place. "Because I should" isn't enough, because "I will be a better person" - great, but you don't care about that when you are tired. You need a reason that feels real when motivation disappears. For me, losing $100 was real enough to get me through the hardest days, and after that the habits started carrying themselves.

I'm not saying everyone should bet money with a friend(and probably you should not), but I do think you need consequences that matter to YOU.

Curious if anyone else found that discipline gets way easier after the first couple of weeks?

Here is my progress(couple of habits are private, but overall there are 16): xdays.io/@davidalsh

Are you drinking enough water? I tend to have some good weeks and some bad weeks. How are you doing and measuring your water intake? I find the water tracker apps extremely annoying. I noticed when I drink my gallon a day or close to it, my skin looks better, I feel healthier, and I eat less so it’s a general win, but I struggle with drinking enough of it.

Long-time lurker here. I got frustrated with habit trackers that let you add unlimited habits, because in practice that just becomes another overwhelming list you abandon after 2 weeks.

So I built Habit8: you get exactly 8 habit slots, no more. The idea is to force focus on the few things that actually matter, then give you real insight: completion rates, streaks, trend graphs, heatmaps, weekly patterns, lifetime stats.

It's free (iOS only right now), collects zero personal data, and has an optional Pro tier for the deeper analytics/exports, with a free trial so you can try it before paying.

Since this sub actually cares about habit-building (not just apps), I'd genuinely value your take: does an 8-habit cap sound helpful or just annoying? What would you want tracked that most trackers miss?

Link: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/habit8/id6790178532

Hey all!

I'm doing some research on how habits form and how to keep them going as I've tried using an App and was not able to keep it going for more than a month. I think it's because it's hidden away and I need to remember to input the completed daily habit, open the phone, open the app, tap on the screen and then go on to scrolling reddit or something.
All the progress is hidden behind a locked screen.

Do you think a physical device (in some form or another) would help with this traction? Few points I can think of which lean towards it:

• You can always see it, so it's a constant reminder to do the thing
• It's non-intrusive. You press that button and you're done
• Keeps a score visible (last X days)

Would love to hear your input, as we all do things differently

It was so hard but Im actually here, and thanks to the sub members I saw a lot of things here that kept me going through hardest moments.

I used to detest cold showers, but I wanted to be more focused at work. Although the first week was difficult, I am now eager for the reset. The dopamine rush is genuine and I have more consistent energy. makes the entire day seem different.

Do any of you practice cold therapy at home?

About 30 of us are starting a 1-week water fast this Sunday at 6:00 PM est, and anyone who wants the accountability is welcome to join.
Everyone has different reasons for fasting, but doing it as a group can make it easier to stay committed and push through the difficult moments.

Each cell is one day, colored by how many calories I had relative to my goal (dark green is on target, light green is within good range, etc). I used to always fall off by week 3 before but what changed was now I can see the full pattern instead of just today’s number.

Also happy to share how I track it/how it’s made!

Hello.

I am part of a graduate class from Pratt institute in New York and we're doing a year long project focus on behavioral change. One of the big topics within that is health and wellness and how its relationship requires us to change habits within our lives.

Something as simple as we know we should eat healthier or sleep earlier but we still enjoy our fast-food and doom scrolling.

We created a survey to understand more of what people go through as they navigate this process.

We hope to get as many responses as possible and any feedback is appreciated!

Thank you!

Hello, I have been intrested in Metacognition and the process of Learning a year back I read a book by Justin Young called "12 maxims for mastery" and it was a decent read. Flash foward a couple weeks ago I wanted to read a physics textbook which was extremely daunting as someone who has never done physics ever so I got a good idea from a specific chaptee from the book that said that basically the best way to learn is to have someone tuto, but having a mentor or a tutor costs alot of money,

So my idea is simply to crowdsource from reddit every possible question you think of, but there are a couple of roadblocks im facing, #1 is typing all the questions is a pain in itself #2 requirements per sub is a pain #3 committing to this habit is hard because of the other two

My remdies for the roadblocks so far are perhaps have prefired posts in a notepad that i can copy and paste this will cut time by alot, and for having difficulty encoding the habit I think its just the friction between me and the textbook not this reddit crowdsourcing thing.

Now what makes this differe t from regular posting? Well its Constant, and systematic. Thats the point, essentially having a free tutor on your phone or having a human chatgpt.

Im over 90 days into getting 10k steps a day. I think it has had a tremendous net positive on my life, but sometimes I stress about it when it's almost bedtime and I still have like 2k to go.

But on mornings when I do a training run (3 to 5 miles) and walk my dog, I get my 10k in and it just gives a feeling of relief and satisfaction. Like the rest of the day is now bonus points lol.

My wife walked in one day as I was sipping on my coffee and says, “Honey, I really wanna learn some cool new things, but finding cool new things to learn about is hard.” Now before I let my big mouth get the better of me by saying, “you ever heard of a book?”, I caught myself... Mainly cause I value my life, and I don't do too well on the sofa given my age and bad back. So instead, I sat up straight, thought long and hard for a solid second, and told her, “give me a day, I’ll have knowledge delivered to you”. Now cause I’m such an amazing husband (or cause I choose to make my life harder) I built my beautiful wife an app that shows summarizes a random wiki article a day (probably should’ve told her to just visit wikipedia in hindsight). Anywhooo, jumping through a few months later… my wife opened it maybe two or three times, my family thought I was a genius (Uncle L said I was a genius after 4 beers and maybe a few shots), and my biggest user became… well… me. If you're curious, Uncle L still hasn't tried the app out till this date... I blame his cataracts. Now cause mama didn’t raise no quitter, I got rid of wikipedia (no the site still works), cleaned up the app (my beautiful wife helped me design it, through her fantastic criticism), got some amazing people with legit creds to help write real articles, got recordings done of said articles, added some games, and voila! I managed to launch a real app.

Now if you’re still reading this, and feel like, “eh, why not, I like learning cool new things too, just like this internet stranger here”, you can check it out through: gekno.app 

I'm also happy to give free lifetime premium access to anyone who wants it. No catch, no strings attached. Just leave a comment and I’ll send a code your way! :)

I started doing something very small a few weeks ago, and it somehow changed my mornings. Nothing dramatic, just a small routine that I now actually follow instead of avoiding it.
I got curious about what small things have worked for other people. It can be anything: a habit, a change in mindset, even a rule you set for yourself and stuck. Honestly, I'm looking for ideas to steal.

i do this dumb thing where ill suddenly get very serious about fixing my sleep or workouts or whatever, then spend 25 minutes renaming reminders and deciding the perfect order for everything. by the time im done i feel weirdly accomplished even tho i havent done teh actual thing once.

maybe planning is just the cleaner version of avoidance idk. if i start embarrassingly small i usually do better, but my brain still wants the whole reset ceremony first. anybody else do this or is that just my fake productivity brain

I had a solid morning routine going for like two months. Wake up early, stretch, journal a bit, then coffee and actually start my day feeling decent. It wasn't perfect but it was working.

Then it got cold and dark in the mornings and everything just fell apart. Now I hit snooze three times and skip most of it. I still do the coffee part obviously but the rest feels impossible when its freezing and I cant see daylight yet.

I know some people say routines shouldnt depend on external stuff but I dont think thats realistic. Your environment matters. I tried doing the same routine anyway and it just made me feel worse about failing.

Thinking maybe I need a different approach for winter instead of forcing the same thing. Like maybe shorter or later or just different activities that dont require as much effort when its dark and cold. Has anyone actually figured out how to adapt their habits to seasons without losing all momentum? Or do you just accept that some habits are seasonal and thats fine.

Why is it that people talk about habits like your mind falls into a frame? is it hyperbole and they're disciplined or what? I've never felt anything get easier after doing it for a long time. Even brushing my teeth is an active and conscious choice and i still have to remember it. Everything. Literally everything, medications, meals, relaxation.

I thought habits were a craving and you could somehow reorganise your life so you crave to do the same things all the time. Some people fall into bad habits like addiction etc because they want to do bad things at whatever given moment.

I'm curious about this since i saw a guy talk about organisation (woefully disorganised here that's why I'm researching) and he stressed that the more habits you create, the easier things become. He says that average daily tasks like laundry and hygiene can become skipped over in your head if you just stick to the frame for long enough. I've been told similar things but i always thought people meant that the work of life becomes easier the more you put your back into it. Talked to my dad and he says yeah, habits are automatic.

Am i mental? Are people able to put themselves on autopilot by doing something for a year?

Thought I'd share how these little habits have changed how conscious I've become about my body and my eating habits.

One of the significant changes that happened after I got drawn to Meditation and Yoga is that I've become conscious of my eating habits. I've been influenced by Paramhansa yogananda lineage and Isha.

I've also noticed how everyone who wants to experience life more fully or experience deep meditative states have become so selective about their food habits.

No wonder why our body is called 'Annamaya Kosha', which literally means "food body."

I don't simply eat whenever I feel like it. I make sure there's a gap of at least 6-8 hours between each meal. I once heard from Sadhguru that if one is over 30 years of age, two meals a day would suffice unless there's a lot of physical activity.

It's been almost 10 years since I came into yoga, and I can definitely say I've become a lot more conscious of my food habits.

To me, everything is about being conscious. One of the simplest things we can do to become conscious about is what food we're consuming and how we're consuming it. It makes a lot of difference.

I prefer eating in silence, although that's not possible every time.

That thing sitting on my plate is not some non-living object. It is life. It has a life of its own. It's willing to offer its life to me, and I bow down to it. When I consume food with utmost gratitude, the way it behaves within me feels very different.

I once heard Sadhguru say, "You're not willing to sacrifice your little finger, but that carrot, or whatever it is, is willing to become a part of you." It's a huge love affair if we're conscious.

I just felt like sharing how this has made me eat with gratitude and how it has made me more conscious of my body.

I feel my capacity to listen to my body has increased. I can sense things much before they become an issue. My body has also become so agile and alert. It's almost like fine-tuning yourself so you can become receptive to life.

There are foods that are considered positive pranic and there are foods considered negative pranic. The positive ones are many, while the negative ones are very few. I'll probably make another post about that if you guys are interested.

These little choices have made so much difference that I feel like I'm floating. When I stand on my terrace or walk in nature, I feel one with the breeze. I feel so connected with everything around me. My body feels so light and agile.

Also, I've been trying to fast every Ekadashi, and that has made a huge impact on my overall well-being.

This has been my experience over the last decade. Have any of you tried something similar? What habits have helped you become more conscious of your body and the way you eat?

I'd love to hear

So I've been trying to build better habits for like two years now and I always did the whole tracker thing with apps and spreadsheets and checking boxes. It felt productive but honestly I think it was making things worse for me.

Last month I just stopped logging everything. I still do my morning routine and go to the gym but I don't mark it down anywhere. And weirdly its been way more sustainable? Like before if I missed one day I'd feel behind and then the whole system would fall apart. Now I just do the thing when I'm supposed to and move on.

I think maybe for some people the tracking creates this weird pressure that backfires. Or maybe I was spending more energy on the tracking than the actual habit. I dunno if this makes sense but its been working better than anything else I tried.

I'm not saying tracking is bad for everyone but if you've been struggling with it maybe try going off the grid for a bit and see what happens. Sometimes less structure is actually more structure if that makes any sense at all.

I built a habit tracker around a different idea. In addition to streaks, you get a monthly discipline score: one number based on how consistently you actually complete your habits month over month.

The part that's helped me the most - habits live inside my daily plan, right next to my actual tasks and calendar, not in a separate app I have to remember to open. I plan tomorrow the night before, my habits are already sitting there in the morning, and there's a home screen widget so I can't pretend I didn't see them.

This app is unique too because unlike other habit tracker apps, you can program these habits into your week on different days and times… ie going to the gym at 5pm on Monday & Wed and 10am on Saturday.

Also we've added alarms as well so that an alarm goes off (if you want) even when your phone is on vibrate. Desktop app coming soon as well.

It's normally a paid app, but right now honest feedback from people who take habits seriously is worth more to me than the revenue. If you comment "plnnr" or DM me and I'll send you a promo code for free lifetime access. First 50 people, in return for honest feedback.

It's iOS only right now. If you're on Android, DM me and I'll add you to the waitlist.