According to Chat GTP, it takes on average 66 days to break an old habit, or form a new one. That’s a bit over two months.

In my November Challenge, I broke two bad habits and I formed a new one: I took salt and processed sugar out of my eating plans, and I established a routine of going for a walk each day. If I couldn’t walk for whatever reason, I did 45 minutes hard on my indoor bike.

You know when a habit forms when you feel guilty that you’re not doing it.
Simple as that.

And you know when you’ve finally kicked a bad habit to the curb when its desire holds no further allure for you.

I knew when I’d broken my addiction to chocolate this past week when I didn’t buy my favourite Toblerone when it was on special. If I’d bought it, I would’ve eaten it.

I didn’t buy it.

I probably need a second month to really cement all this in place, and so I’m continuing my November Challenge into December. And I’m adding one more thing – 45 minutes of weights/yoga/meditation before I go out for my walk.

In the best selling book, Atomic Habits, by James Clear – (I highly recommend it if you haven’t already read it) – the author lays out the four main steps to Behaviour Change:

The Four Laws of Behavior Change:

• Make It Obvious: Identify the cues and ensure they’re visible.

• Make It Attractive: Pair habits with something enjoyable or align them with your identity.

• Make It Easy: Reduce friction; simplify actions to make starting easier.

• Make It Satisfying: Use positive reinforcement to encourage consistency.

3. The Power of Small Changes:

• Focus on improving by just 1% every day. Over time, these small gains compound into significant results.

• Similarly, small errors or negative habits compound in the opposite direction.

4. Identity-Based Habits:

• Rather than focusing solely on outcomes (e.g., losing weight), focus on the kind of person you want to become (e.g., “I am a healthy eater”).

• This shift makes habits align with your self-image, increasing their likelihood of sticking.

5. Habit Stacking:

• Attach a new habit to an existing one to create a chain of actions (e.g., “After I brush my teeth, I will meditate for one minute”).

6. The Role of Environment:

• Shape your surroundings to support your habits. Make good habits easier and bad habits harder by adjusting your environment.

7. The Plateau of Latent Potential:

• Change often appears invisible at first. Progress requires persistence, as results come after crossing a “breakthrough point.”

8. The Goldilocks Rule:

• Habits are most effective when they are in the sweet spot of difficulty—not too hard, not too easy.

For me, the two important factors that make habit changing doable are:

• Habit stacking
• Making it easy.

Habit stacking means that I can’t go out for my walk if I don”t do my 45 mins of exercise/yoga/meditation first. The exercise/yoga/meditation is stacked onto the walk. I can’t do one without the other. So if I really want to do my walk, then I have to do the exercise/yoga/meditation first.

Making it easy means that 45 mins of exercise/yoga/meditation is broken down into 10 mins intense weights, 20 mins of yoga, 15 mins of meditation.

Now, ten minutes of weights, or pushups or sit-ups or other vigorous exercise, is nothing. Nor is 20 mins of yoga. Once I get into my yoga I find 30 mins slips by without my even noticing. Similarly 15 mins of meditation – usually it strings out to 25-30 mins.

But I have to make this achievable each day – so there’s no point setting goals that aren’t practical for my daily life. 45 mins is something I can do – it’s no big deal.

As I age, I realise how important this is. It’s so easy as you get older to find yourself “rusting up.” You can’t bend like you used to. You can’t swivel to look behind you or check your blind spot while driving like you used to.

Yoga fixes that.
It’s the greatest lubricant for rusty bodies that I know.

Next year is going to be huge for Jennifer and me. We’ve got a massive Q&A road tour throughout the US and Canada, and then onto Germany, Austria and Switzerland starting early Feb through to end of May. Then in September we begin production on another film.

We’ll need to be in peak physical condition. This December Challenge will go some way to achieving that – and more importantly, establishing a routine which we can then take with us on the road.

On this, the last day of the November Challenge, I went for a walk in the rain.

It was glorious.
I felt great!

I got soaking wet, but it didn’t matter. I felt energised, I felt fit, I felt 10 years younger than my biological age. (Which is 71, by the way.)

What’s my November Challenge?
Towards the end of October, I set myself a challenge for November. That I would:

– Take a walk of no less than 45 mins each day.
– Put no added salt on my food.
– Eat no processed sugar – chocolate, sweets, ice cream etc.

I set myself this challenge because I had, for a long long time, added salt to whatever meal was put in front of me regardless of how the food tasted. It had become a habit I couldn’t break. Similarly, chocolate after dinner at nights. It was not uncommon for Jennifer and me (mainly me!) to demolish a whole block of Whittaker’s whilst watching telly of an evening.

Not good.
Good, but not good!
Things had to change.
Hence, my November Challenge.

Well, the good news is that I’ve broken the salt and sugar / chocolate addictions.

During the month I’ve had no chocolate, no sweets, no ice cream or gelato. None of it. And I’ve not put salt on any of my food, And coming into December, I’ll hold fast to these mandates.

I was in the supermarket yesterday and I noticed that the particular type of Toblerone chocolate that I used to crave – honey and nougat – was half price. I had no desire to buy it. Normally if it’s half price I’d have bought two.

Not yesterday.
Nup.
No way.
And not tomorrow either.

As for my exercise – you’d think a minimum of 45mins walking a day for 30 days straight would be no trouble for a Camino walker such as myself, however because I’m now 6 ½ years into Parkinson’s, walking for any stretch has become difficult. But other than time off whilst I was travelling this month, I managed to keep to my schedule.

Lately I’ve been doing 4.5km walks at an average of just under 5km/hr – which for me with this PD, that’s good going. I used to be able to do 6.25-6.5km/hr before I took on this condition, but hey, I’m also getting older. There’s that too.

Some days during this November challenge I mixed up my walks with sessions on my indoor bike, and that was useful because on the bike I could push more into my cardio zones. There’s no doubt that at the end of this month, I feel way fitter and way healthier than at the start of the month.

I haven’t lost that much weight (see chart below), but that’s okay – this wasn’t about weight loss. This was about taking back control of my mind. Which I’ve done.

So I’m going to continue my November Challenge into December – which will be harder because of Christmas and the holiday period – but I’ve decided I’m going to add one more thing to my list: 45 mins of exercise and meditation before my walk. Ten minutes of weights, twenty minutes of yoga, and mediation for fifteen minutes. Twenty minutes of yoga isn’t much, nor is 15 mins of meditation, but it’s a start.

I’ve found the trick to these challenges is to keep the bar low – make the goals achievable. You can always outperform if you have the time and/or the inclination. Set the goals too large, then it becomes an impediment each day to even try.

They say it takes roughly 66 days to establish a habit. That’s a bit over two months. So if I can continue this through December, come the start of 2025 I’ll be in a good place.

All up, this November challenge has been very worthwhile!