How do you develop habits? Plus, a Summer Mango, Maca, Macadamia Smoothie

I quite like personality quizzes. I’m curious about people, so I’m drawn to anything that helps me to understand my own and others’ behaviours. Sometimes, this can see me digress into doing useless quizzes like; ‘Which Harry Potter Character would you be?’ or ‘How long would you survive on Game of Thrones?’ (Not long. I’m not ruthless enough.)

A while back, a friend sent me this quiz, about the four tendencies of developing habits. I also recently listened to Brooke McAlary’s podcast with Gretchen Rubin, who designed the quiz. Unlike the Buzzfeed quizzes, this one is truly interesting – it helped me to understand why I’ve been successful at forming some habits but not others – and that this is inherently related to how I went about establishing those habits, rather than the habit itself. I came out as an Obliger, which essentially means I meet outer expectations and resist inner expectations, explaining why I’ve always been so terribly bad at exercising, unless I’m accountable to or doing it with someone else. Additionally, I also have rebel responses to this – periods of time when I become resentful and burnt out, and then stop ‘obliging’ altogether. Continue reading →