Habits are formed and reinforced as we travel through continuous loops that try to satisfy our impulses. Here’s how mindfulness can interrupt the cycle to break bad habits:
If there is an open grass patch in the corner, the kids will cut out and the grass will harden quickly. The ancient people created paths to walk from one place to another. The horses and cows spread them out. And today they are paved roads. When we want to go somewhere, we don’t choose these well-trampled paths.
It’s the same as our brains and muscles and organs that respond to their commands. If the neuron continues to fire in a specific configuration, it is easier to create a path and go there. Neurons “firing together and wire together.” It’s how we learn to talk, play the guitar, paint, smoke and eat too much.
The role of memory in habit formation
As Judson Brewer points out in his cravings, placing memories (the path to return) is as old and rooted as life itself. Eric Kandel received the Nobel Prize in Physiology in 2000. This demonstrated that even large breadbone cousins for humans can employ a “two optional approach” to increase the chances of survival. Similarly, we adapted by laying down memories of what is not food, but where to find it. And critically, food provided us with a reward: a shot of brain chemicals that satisfy hunger. Yam. Yam.
As Brewer points out, hijacking this reward-based learning system and developing other habits is easy. See the smoke of cool kids. Cool smoke. It is considered cool. It feels good. Place a pleasant memory. I want to do it again.
When we raise, this path will bring us back and forth. We’re in a loop. When we see people inhale smoke, we cause us, and the immediate effect is the brain that says, “it makes me feel like I’m better or lessening the pain.” Impulse and cravings appear in the body. We take action to nurture and brighten our cravings. We can get a good feeling (our reward), but we also start to see the world differently. In what psychologists call “salariness,” we now wear smoke-colored glasses and provide a landscape where smoking opportunities are recognized. All this strengthens habits, and an increase in salience shows us more clues and triggers than keeping the wheel spinning. It goes round and round.
Mindfulness can break this worn-out cycle as shown in the diagrams conceived by the brewer below.
How to change your habits with mindfulness
Learn about the mechanisms of habit formation and observe how it works within your mind and body. Habits can be reassessed and changed by injecting awareness and curiosity into the process.
read more 
Mindful Staff August 13, 2021
