Scientific foundations of habit management

Neurobiological research shows that the brain loves to automate behaviours because this way it saves energy. This matters, because the brain is the most “energy-hungry” organ in the body – it uses disproportionately large resources compared to its weight.

Behaviours you repeat often enough gradually “descend” from full conscious control into deeper brain structures, including the caudate nucleus within the basal ganglia. There they become more automated and no longer require constant cognitive effort.

This works both ways:

• this is exactly how health-promoting habits are consolidated,
• and how habits that slowly damage you get wired in.

The good news is that habits can be rebuilt – and not by “willpower only”, but by understanding their mechanics and consciously redesigning the entire habit loop.

Every habit runs on three elements:

• Cue (trigger) – the signal that initiates the behaviour.
• Routine – the behaviour itself, what you actually do.
• Reward – the benefit your brain associates with the behaviour, which is why it wants to repeat it.

Understanding this loop gives you enormous leverage:

• you can change the cue (for example the time of day, place, visual cues),
• you can change the routine (swap in a healthier behaviour for the same cue),
• you can change the reward (so that the brain actually finds it “worth it” to repeat the new habit).

Examples:

– Cue: 6 p.m. → Routine: walk → Reward: favourite tea and the feeling of having “ticked off” a task.
– Cue: waking up → Routine: a glass of water → Reward: a brief sense of agency (“I’ve done something good for myself already at 7:00 a.m.”).

When you see a habit as a cue–routine–reward loop, it stops being something “magical and mysterious”. It becomes a mechanism you can reprogram.

You can try to build habits relying purely on willpower – but that’s one of the least durable models. Willpower behaves like a muscle:

• it gets tired,
• it gets depleted,
• when overused, it weakens.

If you base your health system solely on “I’ll power through”, you quickly begin to feel:

• growing fatigue,
• drop in motivation,
• frustration (“I constantly have to force myself”),
• increasing aversion to the habit itself.

The paradox is that on paper you’re sticking to the plan, but subjectively you feel as if each day is getting heavier. This is a direct path to burnout.

My personal breakthrough

For years I was a textbook example of “willpower as fuel”. I never skipped training. Regardless of mood, fatigue or schedule – the workout had to be done.

On paper it looked impressive. In practice:

• I was permanently exhausted,
• training was associated with stress and rushing,
• I ran into the gym at the last minute,
• during sessions I kept checking the time,
• I went straight back to work afterwards without a moment to breathe.

Training was no longer a reward or privilege – it became another source of pressure. My path to longevity stopped bringing joy. I knew that in this mode sooner or later I would simply break.

How I fixed it

I redesigned my schedule so that training was no longer squeezed “by force” between obligations. Instead of yet another item on a to-do list, it became time for myself:

• a moment when I can be one-on-one with my body,
• I listen to podcasts I have no space for during the day,
• I don’t rush through any exercise,
• after training there’s always a healthy but genuinely delicious meal waiting for me.

The emotional narrative around training changed. It stopped being punishment and became a reward and ritual. The effect?

• real joy from taking care of my health returned,
• sports performance started to improve,
• health markers noticeably improved.

This was one of the biggest shifts in my own longevity journey – and proof that a habit without a good reward will eventually fall apart.

James Clear, author of the well-known book "Atomic Habits", describes four simple yet very practical rules that make it much easier for new habits to “stick”:

• Make it obvious
• Make it attractive
• Make it easy
• Make it satisfying

In longevity practice, this can look like:

• Obviousness – workout clothes prepared and visible, fixed sleep times in your calendar, meals aligned with your circadian rhythm. You don’t wonder “if”; you simply follow what you can see and what’s planned.
• Attractiveness – a walk combined with a favourite podcast, audiobook or music. The brain associates movement not only with effort, but also with pleasure.
• Ease – instead of ambitious intervals at the start: an easy Zone 2 session; instead of 100 push-ups: 10 done well. Effective minimum > maximal but unrealistic.
• Satisfaction – a habit tracker, small rewards, visible progress (for example a step chart, checked-off days, notes in a journal). The brain gets a clear signal: “this works, I want more of it”.

The more of these four laws you meet, the less you have to rely on willpower.

The same rules can be reversed to dismantle harmful habits:

• Make it invisible
• Make it unattractive
• Make it hard
• Make it unsatisfying

For example:

• you remove unhealthy snacks from the house (invisible + harder to obtain),
• you use apps that block social media after a certain time (extra friction),
• you link the old habit to a negative narrative (“this is something that drains my energy and health”),
• you design your environment so that bad choices require effort while good ones happen by default.

The goal is for the brain to stop seeing the old habit as an easy, quick reward.

Goals are necessary – they give direction. But by themselves, they don’t create results. It’s the system – specific micro-actions you repeat daily – that builds your future health.

Instead of thinking “I want to lose 10 kg”, it’s more useful to think:

• “I walk 8–10k steps every day”.
• “I train with weights three times a week”.
• “I don’t eat between meals”.
• “I go to bed before 11 p.m.”.

On a deeper level, identity is key:

• not “I want to lose weight”,
• but: “I am a person who consistently invests in health”.

The system is what you do. Identity is who you become through those actions.

Habits act like compound interest for health. A small improvement, repeated consistently, creates massive change over time.

Being 1% better each day doesn’t sound spectacular, but over a year it leads to a dramatically different starting point. Conversely, being 1% worse each day – constant small concessions – can turn a healthy body into a chronically overloaded one in just a few years.

That’s why at the beginning the effective minimum is often completely sufficient:

• 10 minutes of movement,
• 1 nutrition habit,
• 30 minutes earlier to bed.

What matters is that you do it every day, not that you do it “perfectly”.

Your environment usually has more power than your will. If your kitchen is full of sweets and there’s a phone with TikTok open on your desk, you’ll lose to that setup 9 times out of 10.

That’s why one of the most important tasks is to redesign your surroundings so they “push” you towards better choices:

• a kitchen without junk food and with easy access to healthy options,
• a desk free of distractions, phone out of reach,
• social media apps removed from the home screen,
• people in your circle who reinforce your choices instead of undermining them.

A well-designed environment makes good habits the default, while bad ones require effort.

Every healthy habit is a micro-investment in your biological assets:

• in your metabolism,
• in your brain and cognitive function,
• in your cardiovascular system,
• in your mitochondria,
• in your muscles and bones,
• …and many other areas.

It’s these assets that slow biological ageing and determine how you’ll function at 60, 70 or 80 years old. So habits are not just “a good idea” – they’re the main mechanism through which you actively influence the trajectory of your health.

A bad day is not a failure, it’s statistics. Crises are built into every change process. The key is not to avoid them completely, but how you respond to them.

A helpful rule is: “never twice in a row”. If something falls through one day – it happens. But the next day you return to the habit even at 20% capacity.

If you don’t have the energy for a full workout: do 10 minutes. If your sleep isn’t perfect: at least make sure you have an hour without screens before bed. What matters is keeping the loop alive, not perfection.

In the background there is always a reinforcement loop at work:

Action → benefits → motivation → next action.

The more times you go through this loop, the more the habit becomes part of your identity, and not just “a task to complete”.