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Level 368 of 470

How a small habit becomes automatic: Second argument

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Target
47 WPM
Accuracy
96.1%
XP
86

Section 3 of 5

How a small habit becomes automatic

What actually makes a habit stick?

What you have written so far

Introduction

Almost everyone has tried to start a habit and stopped within a month, and almost everyone explains it afterwards as a failure of willpower. That explanation is popular because it is simple, and it is usually wrong. The habits that survive tend to differ from the ones that die in structure, not in effort.

First argument

The first difference is size. A habit that requires a large block of time competes with everything else in the day, and loses on any day that goes badly. A habit small enough to complete on a bad day never has that argument, which means it is still there when the good days return.

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Accuracy0.0%
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The second is attachment. A new action performed at no particular time is a decision that has to be made afresh every day. Attached to something already automatic, it stops being a decision: the existing habit becomes the reminder, and the effort moves from remembering to doing.

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Notes on this level

What this level is training

This level does not introduce a new key. It drills the left index, right pinky, right index, left middle, right thumb, left ring, right ring, right middle, left pinky fingers on keys you have already met, at a target of 47 words per minute and 96.1% accuracy.

Speed at this stage comes from removing hesitation rather than from moving faster. If your accuracy is above the target but your speed is not, the gap is almost always time spent deciding, not time spent pressing.

Most difficulty at this stage is technique rather than effort. These explain the technique.