It’s advice I frequently give when people consult me about changing a habit.

“Don’t trust your brain!”

Mastering your life and habits will empower you to create the lifestyle you want.

But if you think desire and intentions to change a habit will do the trick, you’ve fallen into a very common trap.

Just this week, a woman told me she needs to lose weight, but she finds herself in the same behavioral patterns within a few days of having resolved to change.

She looked at me with tears welling up in her eyes as she explained her deep desire to master her weight.

She also described her tendency to stop and gorge on high-calorie food on her way home from work, only to feel guilty afterword.

She was feeling ashamed to admit it.  What’s the cause of her shame?

Trusting her brain.

She trusted her instinct-driven, impulsive brain with something that would influence her self-esteem and life satisfaction for the rest of her life.

She needed a plan to make her brain do what she wanted it to do.

That’s where the principles of Life Modification come in really handy.

We got straight to work, and by the time she left my office, she knew things were going to change, because she was no longer leaving the change to chance.

You see, we developed a series of choice points that would force the unconscious decision making process into the conscious realm (which gives her back the control).

What are choice points?  I’ll get to that in a moment.

After setting the choice points, we developed a series of artificial reminders that would literally force her to make a conscious decision about what she wanted to do with her life (and we set the artificial reminders at specifically chosen points that would maximize her success during each day).

We created a vision for what she really wants in her life and we set a very specific deadline related to highly charged emotions that would be easily accessible when she reached each choice point.

A choice point is a fork in the road that relates to a predetermined point in time when you know you will either face a natural temptation (for example, driving by your favorite fast food restaurant) or a self-created choice point  (such as an alarm on your cell phone going off when it’s time to do some exercise).

If you simply say, “I should exercise more,” you are trusting your brain too much.

Your brain will tell you to rest when the moment comes.  By creating an alarm that jolts you out of your complacence and anchors your choice to the powerful emotions that led to your initial decision to lose weight, you will be in a fight you can actually win.

If you’re ready to fight, get in the ring.  The Life Modification community will have your back.

-Dr. Todd Snyder