We all have aspects of our personalities that frustrate us. They could be considered as faults or idiosyncrasies, or simply habits we wish to change.

But habits are extremely hard to combat, especially as many of them are hard-wired into us, often because we’ve spent considerable years practising them. Perhaps we’ve not given conscious thought to modifying our behavioural patterns because we can work around them or override them in our professional lives.

The habits I’m talking about are things like: difficulties making decisions, easily becoming stressed or distracted, or obsessive compulsive behavioural patterns. These aspects of our personalities are like a layer cake – we can hide the ones we don’t wish to reveal, perhaps for fear of judgment. We are, after all, actors!

But what happens when we want to set ourselves goals to change more pressing habits like wishing to quit alcohol or cigarettes, or lose/gain weight? Sadly, too many of us have tried and not been successful, year after year, which perpetuates our habits and renders us feeling awful about ourselves: Cake is fragile!

So my advice is to get to know your habits, make friends with them ALL and bring them into your conscious thinking. In so, you are firstly admitting that they co-exist in you, and secondly you are creating a foundation for positive habit changes. Making these adaptations in your life does actually work!

I, for example, suffer from anxiety, and bring it to the forefront of my thoughts by talking about it. Whenever I feel the stress coming along, I remind myself of the value of correcting my breathing (I like box-breathing), and by taking a five minute break, as opposed to giving up. I also used to suffer with OCD – it’s still with me, but not nearly as much of a nuisance.

Before I bought it to my conscious awareness, I’d have to end brushing my teeth on a particular tooth, or I’d feel the need to check that I’d turned my hair straighteners off far too many times – even driving back to the house to check again! It played a part in many areas of my life.
Now, for example, when I’ve finished with my straighteners, I say: “Emma you are unplugging your straighteners and look, you are safely placing them on your stone bathroom floor!”

Such a little change, such a BIG result: I KNOW the straighteners are safe because talking aloud to myself is easy to recall. My anxiety therefore doesn’t peak, and my breathing doesn’t need rectifying. With brushing my teeth, I now make sure that I deliberately stop at a different area every time – I say: “No Emma, this truly doesn’t matter!”

Start by becoming self-aware of your idiosyncrasies and make friends with them – bring them into your conscious mind and see if any of my ideas can help you.