Focus on what you can do, not what you can't do!

Do you want to successfully lose weight, quit smoking, or put a lid on your bad temper? We all have some habits we would like to change, sounds easy but consider how often you have been successful? Rather than focusing only on the bad habits themselves the question we need to ask is how will you replace the poor habits with good ones? Research on thought suppression (eg "Don't think about white bears!") has shown that tyring to avoid a thought makes it even more active in your mind. The same holds true when it comes to behaviour - by trying not to engage in a bad habit, our habits get stregthened rather than broken. If you want to change your ways, ask yourself, what will I do instead?