The Power of Habit - Charles Duhigg

• Basal ganglia, at the center of brain at spinal chord, responsible for habits.
• Habit is a loop- cue, routine & reward.
• Habits can be ignored, changed or replaced. But, it never disappears!
• We don't remember the experiences that create habit. But once it's lodged within our brains they influence how we act.
• Identifying the cues, and altering it slightly can stop your habit. 
• Work on a keystroke habit. It can change eventually your rest all habits!
•  When reward turns into craving: Habit develops from the cue
• Not all rewards are compelling(craving) for cue, routing & reward to turn into habit.
• You can't extinguish an Habit, but you can change! For the same cue & reward just work on changing routine.
• Practice a routine repeatedly until it becomes habit and you don't need split sec to think doing it!
• You can change an habit by identifying cue & reward that causes craving, and change the routine.
• For some habits there's another ingredient: belief.
• Habits developed to achieve any tasks quickly with no second thought can vanish in crucial/ stressful times.
• That is your replacement habits will break during stressful situation! (like alcoholic who was sober gets drunk after knowing his mom was diagnosed with cancer!)
• replacement habits won't work until we believe that we can overcome them in difficult situation or higher power.
• High mental & physical discipline won't help you sustain through difficulties. It is the culture/ keystone habit that will help you! Example: meeting groups of like minded people will help you.
• Dozens of studies show that will power is the single most keystone habit for individual's success. Self-discipline dictated performance in academics than IQ. And this is possible by making will power into habit.
• But willpower is like muscle, if you use your willpower a lot a day you would succumb to others. Ex: this explains why successful people end up having extramarital  affair! They would have used their willpower all day at work.
• But, if you strengthen your willpower in one part of your life that will spillover into other part of your life. That's why signing kids up for music or sports is important!
• In work place to increase will power of employees, give them a sense of control to make decisions rather than controlling them!
• A company's dysfunctional habit can't change just because a leader orders it. Rather, wise executives seek out for crisis - or create the perception of crisis- and cultivate a sense that something must change!
• Week & close ties hare always helpful!