Why are Habits so Powerful?

It’s well-known that habits are powerful and make the difference between being successful or being a miserable pile of failure. A high school student I was working with yesterday readily acknowledged that he got in a bad habit of doing his homework only for classes he liked, and pretty much ignored doing work in his other classes.

The prime reason he gave: habit.

At least he was honest about it.

It led us to not just accept habit as the holy grail of productivity, which it is, but to ask why is habit the holy grail of productivity.

The best answer we came up with: people, by nature, are animals who like habits. We do most of the same things the same way everyday.

Why fight nature?

Trying to accomplish a project – or get solid grades – without changing deep habits is like someone being a spastic pretending to be a dancer.