Here’s my honest book review of Atomic Habits.
This book has been sitting in my Audible library for quite some time now. Many of my friends and work colleagues have all told me great things about this title. I love a good self-improvement book so I bought it.
I made the assumption that this book would be about building routines so I decided to wait to listen to it. It would have been hard for me to commit to a set routine with babies that did not sleep through the night.
Hence, I opted to read it when I felt the time was right
My assumptions were totally wrong. This isn’t a book about building a rigorous early morning routine as I had anticipated. It’s about making small sustainable tweaks and changes. It’s about the one degree shifts that ultimately lead to compounding change.
Why I finally picked up this book
Honestly, my two year old and my five year old are still not even sleeping through the night. My sleep routine had nothing to do with why I chose to finally listen to this book.
I actually wanted to break a bad habit; drinking wine twice a week. Sometimes three. That’s two to three days a week that my work productivity suffered and my mom-ing skills suffered. That means my bank account and my children suffer.
I also recognized that my body was being impacted. I’ve been doing pilates consistently for the last 4 months and my progress is not as significant as I would expect. I knew this lag had less to do with my output: pilates; and more to do with my input: what I eat and drink.
This is how I know how important consumption is in relation to body weight.
When I was pregnant with my second child I actually lost weight at first. At least ten pounds in the first trimester. Not because I was working out. Not because I had morning sickness. I barely even had nausea with either of my pregnancies.
Of course I was not drinking alcohol while I was pregnant, but I was also craving fresh foods. I had strong food aversions against fried and greasy foods. I would crave smoothies and fish.
I didn’t really start gaining weight until half way through my pregnancy. It felt really nice to not have my t-shirt sleeves hugging my arms.
So despite not having a habit I wanted to build, I started listening to Atomics in hopes of breaking bad habits and perhaps replacing them with better ones.
These are the golden nuggets that I loved about this book
It’s about the journey, not the goal.
It’s about working backwards from your goal.
It’s about small and easy commitments rather than a drastic lifestyle change.
Habits connect themselves to triggers.
If I knew then, what I know now, I would have started listening to this book a long time ago. So if you have some kind of goal you want to achieve or behavior pattern you want to change, start listening to or reading this book now.