Look at yourself! Are you living a happy, healthy, and successful life? Do you know the best habits to adopt for a better life?
Best habits can vary depending on an individual’s preferences, goals, and lifestyles. It refers to actions or activities that benefit mental well-being, physical growth, and overall success.
Adopting best habits is crucial, leading to a fulfilling and meaningful existence. Examples of best habits include meditation, morning routine, mindfulness, prioritizing tasks, saying no, etc.
Let us explore the 11 essential successful habits and practical ways to adopt them
Table of Contents
What are Good Habits?
Habits are daily behaviors that we do by default. Good habits are those positive actions and behaviors that we continually engage in. The adoption of these best habits has a positive effect on our social, psychological, and physiological aspects.
Examples of good habits may include habitually reading books, meditation, journaling, or doing exercise; it will positively affect us. We will be pleased and satisfied when we repeat these actions. Therefore, the adoption of these good habits is crucial.
What Healthy Habits Do You Have?
Before moving on to the best habits to adopt for a better life and the practical ways to adopt the best habits, let’s figure out what healthy habits you have.
Ask yourself the following Questions:
- Do you get up early? (Yes/No)
- Do you drink eight glasses of water every day? (Yes/No)
- Are you grateful for what you have? (Yes/No)
- Are you an optimistic thinker? (Yes/No)
- Do you manage your time correctly for your tasks? (Yes/No)
If YES, then Congratulations!
If NO, then Don’t Panic!!
This guide is going to help you with the best habits to adopt.
3 Types of Great Habits to Adopt
You can become a better version of yourself by investing time in personal development. All the successful habits are crucial to adopt, as they take you closer to living a happy and successful life.
The best habits to adopt are divided into three groups:
- Self-care habits
- Happiness habits
- Productive habits
List of 11 Best Habits to Adopt for a Better Life
Following is the list of healthy habits you can adopt to live a happier and more effective life.
Self-care Habits
Self-care or healthy habits are made to care for your physical, psychological, and emotional health. Following are a few of the best healthy habits to adopt:
1. Meditation
What is the most critical organ in the human body? The Brain. For self-care, the peace of your mind should be given top priority. Therefore, meditation is the most important and best habit to adopt.
Meditation is an exercise of the mind. In this, you focus on one aspect and put a break to the stream of thoughts crowding your mind. It helps you relax and calm your mind.
If your mind is filled with negativity, you will always see the worst in everything. But relaxing your mind will help you regain positivity, clarity, and focus.
2. Morning Routine
Henry David Thoreau says, “An early morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.” Developing a morning routine is one of the best habits to adopt. You can add the following things to your morning routine.
| Tasks to do | Benefits |
| Drink plenty of water | It increases metabolism by up to 25%, increases energy, and increases red blood cell count. |
| Brush your teeth | Fresh breath, stronger teeth, prevents gum diseases and tooth decay |
| Exercise | Removes the signs of aging, promotes better sleep |
| Eat breakfast | It improves energy level and concentration, helps manage weight, and reduces the risk of diseases like heart disease and type II diabetes. |
3. Plan Your Meals
Another important self-care habit is planning your meals. This best healthy habit is essential because it promotes nourishment, well-being, and mindfulness.
Here is a general guide for planning your meals.
- Select nutrient-rich food for a week and put it on your calendar.
- Then, make a grocery list covering all the required items.
- After having access to everything, choose a day to chop the vegetables and prepare things necessary for cooking.
- When hungry, you could directly refer to the recipe. Cook food instantly and enjoy!
4. Develop Constructive Hobbies
As Jack Canfield argues, “Your habits will determine your future.” So, by developing constructive hobbies, you can gain joy, contentment, and fulfillment.
Here is a list of some hobbies you can develop:
- Reading – helps you enhance your vocabulary besides providing pleasure.
- Writing – enables you to improve your self-expression of thoughts, emotions, and ideas.
- Drawing or painting – leads you to show your artistic side.
- Yoga and meditation – promote physical, emotional, and mental well-being.
- DIY Projects – creates a sense of self-accomplishment and satisfaction.
So, you can adopt these best habits as it will help you transform your life.
Happiness Habits
The next group of habits is classified as happiness habits because they provide contentment and self-satisfaction, mental relief, and resilience.
1. Gratitude Habits
Have you ever felt gratitude towards what you have? Maybe you are thinking what exceptional blessing you have to be grateful for.
You have also heard the proverb, Count your blessings. Come on, Let us try to count some of our blessings; put your finger down on each blessing:
- You have your meals daily.
- You have your hands, feet, and arms working upright.
- You can see the world with your eyes.
- You can touch, taste, smell, and breathe without any difficulty.
- You can get an education.
- You have your parents, friends, family.
Aren’t these the blessings that we always take for granted? To live a happy life, adopt the best habit of gratitude and stop comparing yourself to others.
2. Optimism
To live a happy life, you need to follow an optimistic mindset. What is optimism? A mind filled with hope and confidence in a positive future and success.
We as humans are only sometimes optimistic about our tasks and future. Whenever we try to do something new, we believe we will fail. And this is the point that needs to be challenged.
The first step to success is your positive mindset that YES, I can do this, and I will prove myself.
Having an optimistic mindset is one of the daily habits of happiness experts. You could also become one by adopting these best habits.
3. Spend more Time with Friends
Spending quality time with your friends provides you with laughter and helps you relieve mental stress and tension. It is one of the most neglected best habits to adopt.
You might have heard the phrase, “Friends, don’t let friends do silly things alone.”
I connect with my friends whenever I feel stressed or anxious. They not only helped me resolve my tension but also gave silly suggestions. Their advice gives comfort and becomes a way of making me smile.
You can spend time with your friends in the following ways:
- Regular communication
- Hangouts
- Birthday celebrations
- Mailing each other
- Sharing memes or reels
Productive Habits
The last group of habits is classified as productive habits that ultimately lead to success. Also, they help you increase your effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction with your daily work.
1. Practice Mindfulness
What is mindfulness? It is the ability to be fully present in the present moment. It involves full attention to your thoughts, surrounding environment, and bodily sensations without judgment.
Practicing mindfulness is a good habit to adopt because it helps relieve stress. Adopting this habit will be a coping mechanism for bad habits for mental health as it will help you in improving cognitive outcomes such as reduced depression, anxiety, and stress.
For instance, sometimes you are attending a lecture, but your mind is wandering in tension about your future goals. By practicing mindfulness, you can interrupt these cycles of your thoughts and focus on the present moment, i.e., the lecture.
2. Prioritizing Your Task
According to Stephen Covey, “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.”
Prioritizing your task is another one of the best habits to adopt. It ensures you invest your efforts and time in the most effective and crucial tasks.
You can prioritize your task in the following ways:
- Make a to-do list
- Put urgent and crucial tasks at the start
- Keep in mind the deadlines
- Break large tasks into smaller, accessible parts
- Limit multitasking and focus on one task
So, by doing this, you can adopt the best habit.
3. Saying ‘No’
Sometimes, we are asked to do something we are unwilling to do. And we try to do it by hooks or crooks because we do not want to hurt others.
It creates tension not only for us but also for our productivity. In such a scenario, we must learn the art of saying ‘NO.’
Why?
Because it is an essential successful habit for preserving your well-being, maintaining boundaries, and managing time effectively.
How can we say no? In the following ways:
- Providing reasons
- Be clear and direct
- Firmness in your decisions
- Setting boundaries
- Offer alternatives
Therefore, you can adopt this best habit.
4. Time Management
“Time is money.” Just like money is necessary and needs to be spent cautiously, so is time. It would help if you were careful of how you spend your time.
Time management is one of the best habits to adopt to become successful in your life.
As it becomes difficult for an old habit to die hard, so is this habit. If you procrastinate and always lead your work to the last moment, you must learn skills to manage your time.
To earn success in your life, you need to come out of your comfort zone and do things that are against your will.
Manage your time for your most essential tasks. You can manage your time in the same way you prioritize your tasks, as discussed earlier.
6 Practical Ways to Adopt Best Habits
Developing habits is a time-consuming and strenuous task that only occurs after some time. But the below-mentioned ways will help you adopt successful habits. The seven practical ways to adopt the best habits are:
I. Setting Small Goals
You need to focus on one habit at a time to adopt the best habits. Start by setting SMART goals, i.e., specific, manageable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.
You need to be clear in your goal orientation. It will give you clear objectives to stay on your track of habit development.
II. Making Routine
Incorporate your desired habit into your current schedule. It takes 66 days to form a new habit.
It involves the establishment of a group of structured tasks that we perform at regular intervals of time. It requires self-awareness, adaptability, and experimentation.
By making a new routine, you can get your desired outcomes in the form of the adoption of successful habits.
III. Tracking Your Progress
Whatever you do, keep recording it with yourself. Whenever you make progress in following your routine or achieving your goal, monitor it.
Keep a journal or use the notion to track your habits and progress for measuring your consistency. Throughout your journey towards success, review what you have achieved and what obstacles you faced.
IV. Creating Triggers
Another way to adopt the best habits is to create triggers. Associate the new habit you want to adopt with certain triggering factors in your surroundings.
Triggers can serve as cues that remind you to do specific tasks. For instance, you can set an alarm as a cue to drink water daily. Whenever you hear the alarm, you will be prompted to drink water.
V. Rewarding Yourself
A practical way to adopt the best habit is by rewarding yourself.
You can associate your success with something rewarding, as it effectively reinforces positive behaviors and milestones.
You can reward yourself with a walk, a movie, a chocolate, or a food of your liking to achieve each goal to keep yourself motivated and celebrate your success.
VI. Creating a Supportive Environment
Be patient and take help when needed.
Why? Because creating a supportive environment is necessary for the adoption of best habits. You can surround yourself with people having positive influences.
Moreover, connect with people who share your passion, goals, and habits. Encircle yourself with support, encouragement, and positivity.
Conclusion
It can be summed up as good habits referring to positive actions and behaviors. The 11 best habits to adopt mentioned in the guide are divided into three groups: self-care habits, happiness habits, and productive habits.
Moreover, six practical ways exist to adopt these best habits for a better life. The ways include setting small goals, making a routine, creating triggers, tracking progress, rewarding yourself, and creating a supportive environment.
You could also share this guide with your loved ones to help them be successful and happy by adopting these best habits.
