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Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results - Atomic Habits by James Clear

2020-05-10 · Long video (solo, talking head or whiteboard) · Ali · recording, 11:12 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Health, sleep and habits (also: Goals, purpose and life design) · mode: Explanation and tutorial · tags: Lesson from a book

In the second Book Club episode Ali summarises James Clear's Atomic Habits: 1% improvements compound, systems beat goals, identity drives habit change, and the four laws of behaviour change, adding his own cases: no goals for his channel, a healthy-person identity, vitamin D tablets moved beside his finasteride, audiobooks and a spa after the gym.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Small habits compound into remarkable results; Book Club episode two and the book's four insights

  • ★★ We all tend to overestimate the importance of single actions and underestimate the power of making small improvements repetitively over a longer period of time. Real change comes from the compound effects of hundreds of small decisions or small habits that, over time, accumulate to produce remarkable results — 00:00:00
  • ★★ This video is the second episode of Book Club, Ali's new series summarising the key ideas of his favourite books, on Atomic Habits by James Clear. — 00:00:29 · Book Club, Atomic Habits, James Clear

00:01:20 — Why 1% matters: compounding, time as ally or enemy, the plateau of latent potential

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): In Atomic Habits James Clear argues that getting 1% better each day for a year makes you 37 times better, while getting 1% worse each day takes you nearly to zero. — 00:01:27 · Atomic Habits, James Clear

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): In Atomic Habits James Clear calls habits the compound interest of self-improvement: they make little difference on a given day, but an enormous one over months or years. — 00:01:27 · Atomic Habits, James Clear

    “habits are the compound interest of self-improvement”

  • ★★ Ali says he really struggles to focus on things with long-term benefits because modern society is attuned to instant gratification, and thinks this probably applies to everyone. (hedged) — 00:01:27

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear says time magnifies the margin between success and failure: good habits make time your ally, bad habits make it your enemy. — 00:01:56 · James Clear
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's plateau of latent potential: habits seem to make no difference until a critical threshold, because compounding delays outcomes, so a valley of disappointment comes first. — 00:02:26 · James Clear
  • ★★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear argues for systems over goals; his first problem with goals is that winners and losers share them, so goals cannot be what differentiates people. — 00:02:55 · James Clear

00:03:08 — Systems rather than goals: four problems with goals, no goals for his channel, the score takes care of itself

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's second problem with goals: achieving one changes life only for the moment, so what needs to change is the system that caused the results. — 00:03:24 · James Clear
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's third problem with goals: they restrict happiness, because they assume happiness comes once the goal is reached and so keep putting it off. — 00:03:24 · James Clear

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's fourth problem with goals: they are at odds with long-term progress, since goals are for winning the game and systems for continuing to play it. — 00:03:53 · James Clear

    “The purpose of building systems is to continue playing the game.”

  • ★★★ Ali deliberately sets no goals for his YouTube channel, such as a million subscribers: he loves the process of making videos, which is fun, makes money and is sustainable. — 00:03:53

  • ★★ Ali says watching the scoreboard all game would not help a player; ignoring the score and focusing on a better process or strategy would probably bring the best score. (hedged) — 00:04:22
  • ★★ Ali cites the line "the score takes care of itself" from Bill Walsh, Super Bowl-winning coach of the San Francisco 49ers, and thinks it probably applies to much tracking and measurement. (hedged) — 00:04:52

  • ★★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear says identity change is the North Star of habit change, with three layers: outcomes, processes and systems, and identity. — 00:04:52 · James Clear

    “identity change is the North Star of habit change”

00:05:10 — Identity change is the North Star of habit change; his identity-based approach to eating and the gym

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear says most people work from outcome to identity rather than the reverse, and that the ultimate intrinsic motivation is a habit that becomes part of your identity. — 00:05:21 · James Clear
  • ★★★ Ali used to approach eating and exercise by outcomes, such as losing belly fat with Tim Ferriss's slow-carb diet; since Atomic Habits he thinks "I am a healthy person" and acts accordingly. — 00:05:50 · Tim Ferriss, Atomic Habits
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear splits building a habit into four stages: the cue triggers the action, the craving gives the motivation, the response is the habit, and the reward is the end goal. — 00:06:19 · James Clear

00:06:30 — How to build a habit: cue, craving, response and reward

  • ★★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear derives his four laws of behaviour change from the four stages of a habit: cue, craving, response and reward. — 00:06:49 · James Clear
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's first law of behaviour change is make it obvious: design your environment around the cues of your habits. — 00:06:49 · James Clear
  • ★ Ali has taken finasteride tablets against hair loss for more than a year. — 00:06:49

00:06:50 — The four laws of behaviour change, with his vitamin D tablets, audiobooks, guitar and spa

  • ★★★ Ali kept forgetting his vitamin D tablets until he moved them beside the finasteride he takes daily; now he takes both every night, a habit built almost immediately. — 00:07:18
  • ★★★ Ali's principle of environment design: put fewer steps between you and good behaviours and more steps between you and bad ones. — 00:07:46 · friction
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's second law is make it attractive: it works on the craving stage and dopamine, since people are motivated by the anticipation of reward. — 00:07:46 · James Clear
  • ★★ To make going to the gym attractive, Ali started listening to fantasy audiobooks on Audible. — 00:08:15 · Audible
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's third law is make it easy: reduce friction and prime your environment for the habits you want to develop. — 00:08:15 · friction, James Clear

  • ★★★ Ali says friction is the most powerful force in the universe, a phrase he may have coined or read: anything that makes a good thing slightly easier pays dividends. — 00:08:15 · friction

    “friction is the most powerful force in the universe”

  • ★★ Because a piano and a guitar sit right next to his desk, Ali's default procrastination when he cannot be bothered to work or film is playing them. — 00:08:44 · friction

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear's fourth law is make it immediately satisfying; his cardinal rule of behaviour change: what is immediately rewarded is repeated, what is immediately punished is avoided. — 00:08:44 · James Clear
  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): James Clear says short bursts of dopamine from a McDonald's drive-thru or scrolling Instagram reinforce bad habits, so good habits need some immediate gratification attached. — 00:09:13 · Instagram, James Clear
  • ★★★ After a workout Ali sometimes swims a length or two and reads in the spa for about 20 minutes, which makes the gym immediately satisfying and him far more likely to go. — 00:09:43

00:10:12 — What makes Atomic Habits powerful; habits as a lifestyle to live

  • ★★ James Clear (quoted): Atomic Habits inverts the four laws for bad habits: make good habits obvious, attractive, easy and satisfying, and bad habits invisible, unattractive, hard and unsatisfying. — 00:10:12 · Atomic Habits
  • ★★ Ali says the great power of Atomic Habits is its emphasis on systems rather than goals, identity rather than outcomes, and small habits rather than drastic change. — 00:10:12 · Atomic Habits
  • ★★ Ali says there is no precise answer to how long it takes to build a habit, because a habit is not a finish line to cross but a lifestyle to live. — 00:10:12

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: Atomic Habits · four laws of behaviour change · friction · identity-based habits · James Clear

Also: People: Bill Walsh · Tim Ferriss · Zac Efron

Projects: Book Club

Organizations: Instagram · McDonald's

Concepts: dopamine · habit loop · plateau of latent potential

Products: Audible · Finasteride

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