A Few Goal Hacks

Time for new years resolutions!! Now even though you shouldn't procrastinate til new years... most of us will probably do it anyway. And most people (up to 92%) will likely fail. When you're setting some new goals for the next 28 days, here's a hack to help you be successful.

In his book, The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology that Fuel Success and Performance at Work, happiness researcher Shawn Achor discusses how he wanted to make practicing guitar a daily habit.

However, he encountered a problem that plagues everyone: He couldn’t motivate himself to do it. No matter how much he tried to motivate himself, his guitar remained in his cupboard. Achor recalls:

The guitar was sitting in the closet, a mere 20 seconds away, but I couldn’t make myself take it out and play it. What had gone wrong? [1]

The Problem with Willpower

Achor’s problem is a common one:

If you want to change a habit in the long-term, in the beginning, you have to rely on willpower. But willpower is a finite resource and can’t be relied on.

In other words, the more decisions you make on a daily basis – the order in which to organise your agenda, what to order for lunch, when to do your groceries and so on – the more likely you are to experience what psychologists call “decision fatigue”.

Once you experience decision fatigue, improving habits – especially at the end of a stressful day – becomes less of a priority. Habitual, negative behaviours like forgoing the gym in favour of easier ones like watching television, become routine. It becomes an almost inescapable rut.

Given a choice: Disempowering habits almost always trump behaviours that stretch us. They offer us a path of least resistance and when regularly forged, becomes the easier choice.

But, what if you we had a tool to reshape that path entirely? A tool that made positive habits more accessible?

What You Need To Focus On

A common problem people have with changing their habits is learning how to start.

If you think of a habit, you tend to think of the habit in its entirety. All habits are comprised of multiple steps; tiny actions required to necessitate it and thinking about it is enough to overwhelm anyone.

For example, when you think about going to the gym, you don’t focus on the routine part of The Habit Loop (exercising), you focus on everything else you need to do to do the habit.

You think about packing your gym bag, travelling to the gym, changing into your gym clothes, warming up, exercising, showering, warming down and travelling home.

That’s a lot!

You don’t need to think about all of that: Simply focus on the first action you need to take (in my case, when going to the gym, I only focus on picking up my gym bag which is placed by my front door).

However, what if we redirected our focus from not only what we needed to do to start our habits, but also, how we could make that start as easy as possible?

Using Activation Energy

Activation energy, as Achor explains, is that spark you need to start:

In physics, activation energy is the initial spark needed to catalyse a reaction. The same energy, both physical and mental, is needed of people to overcome inertia and kickstart a positive habit.

In Achor’s example, he realised that having to remove his guitar from his closet to practice, increased the effort he needed to practice – even if that effort only cost him an extra 20 seconds.

Those 20 seconds meant the difference between doing his habit – and not.

He came to a resolution: To put his guitar in the centre of his apartment.

The results?

He practiced guitar for 21 days straight without exception.

Achor called this “The 20 Second Rule”. He comments:

Lowering the barrier to change by just 20 seconds was all it took to help me for a new habit.

Using the 20 Second Rule to Replace Negative Habits

The 20 Second Rule can not only be used to build new empowering habits, but it can be used to ease the transition between negative and positive ones as well.

Achor’s next experiment was to replace watching television when he returned home from work with reading and writing his book.

This time, he took the batteries out of his remote and moved them – you guessed it – 20 seconds away in another room.

Here were his findings:

The next few nights when I got home from work, I plopped down on the couch and pressed the ‘on’ button on the remote – usually repeatedly – forgetting that I had moved the batteries. Then, frustrated, I thought to myself, ‘I hate that I do these experiments’. But sure enough, the energy and effort required to retrieve the batteries – or even to walk across the room and turn the TV on manually – was enough to do the trick.

How You Can Use the 20 Second Rule

There are multiple ways you can experiment the 20 Second Rule, just remember as a rule of thumb:

You need to decrease the activation energy you need to do positive habits and increase it to do negative habits.

If you want to replace a bad habit like drinking alcohol after work with a better one, consider moving your pint glasses to another room in your house or leaving alcohol that’s best served chilled, unrefrigerated (no one wants to drink a beer or white wine that hasn’t been chilled).

If you’d like to minimise the number of hours you spend online, delete your social media apps on your smart phone (one I’m currently experimenting with) or install a plugin for your browser that limits you Internet usage. You can’t disable this plugin because it requires extra effort – and activation energy. [2]

If you want to eat more healthily, consider doing one weekly grocery shop for the whole week. Prepare your lunch and dinner meals in advance or leave your credit/debit card at home to minimise the temptation of ordering takeaways on your journey home after a stressful day.

A Final Word

There’s no doubt about it: Changing habits is difficult, but by understanding activation energy, we can replace negative behaviours with better ones – and all in under 20 seconds.

Cheat Sheet for Bad Days

We all have bad days. Days when we're super limbic, and reptilian. In a few weeks is the most depressing day of the year. The good news is there are a lot of things you can do to try to get yourself back to your prefrontal cortex. Remember that's where happiness, productivity, problem solving etc is located. There are a lot of different strategies and not all of them will work for everyone all of the time. I thought I'd start my own cheat sheet of ideas to do when I'm feeling down. This list will grow as I study and learn more.

But first a quick warning. Remember this pic?

Often when we're down, we're looking for a quick & easy fix to make us feel good. Dopamine is a fast feel good chemical that we get from a lot of our pleasure from. Seeking some fun and pleasure isn't bad... as long as it isn't contrary to your values and goals. Make sure that you don't give in to the 'easy' solution at the expense of your long term goals. Too often people to unhealthy things such as junk food, video games, porn, drugs to feel better for awhile.

Now without further ado, the cheat sheet. Scroll down for more details on each one.

1. Hugs - Interaction and touch with those that you love produces oxytocin, which makes you feel better.
   
   
   
    
2. Talk it out - Negative & irrational thoughts in your head will sound more reasonable and believable. Get them out of your head, and get some perspective by talking it out with someone you care about. A caveat is to not choose someone who will enable you in your irrational thoughts. That may feel good short term to be validated, but won't help long term.
3. Service - TONS of benefits to service. Get outside yourself, think of others. This produces a cocktail of good chemicals (Dopamine, seratonin, oxytocin, etc), and helps lift others.
4. Exercise - Produces endorphins and is healthy for your body 
5. Power pose - Our body language affects our brain chemistry and how we feel. Power pose for 2 min will decrease cortisol (stress) and increase testosterone (power). 
6. Smile - Similar to power posing, forcing a smile can actually make you feel a little better. Going through the motions can help create the emotions. 
7. Yoga - Yoga is relaxing, and has been shown to increase production of GABA, a chemical that tempers the nasty feelings from your limbic system & brain stem. 
8. Meditation - Fires up the left prefrontal region of your brain, and produce dopamine.
9. Journaling - 
1. Negative - Once again, get the negative & irrational thoughts out of your head and out of the shadows. Writing the thoughts down helps to do this. Recognize & challenge the thoughts, and replace it with a positive one.
2. Positive - Writing a gratitude journal is more preventative, but as you regularly write positive experiences, you'll fire neurons in your brain. Literally you're rewiring the brain to scan for the positive, instead of the negative.
10. Talking back - After getting the thoughts out of your head, have some righteous attitude towards the thoughts and talk back to yourself. Challenge the thoughts. It's even been found that if you name the feelings you're having, it lessons the limbic response. In the words of Dan Sievel, "Name it to tame it"
11. Laughing - Laughing gives a bunch of good chemicals as well. Find something to laugh about.
    
12. Sunlight - We've seen the affects of less sunlight in cases of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). If possible, get outside and get some sun. This will boost your B6 and B12, helping your mood.
13. Get to work - Doing something that requires work, concentration and productivity will give you a sense of accomplishment (along with healthy dopamine) and boost confidence. Don't sit around feeling bad. Get up and do something productive.
14. Be Around Happy People - Emotions are contagious. Being around someone cheerful can help bring you up. Also there are neurons in our brain called mirror neurons that fire when we see someone doing it, as if we were doing it ourselves. This can help give us a lift.

All these things have something in common. They require action. So get up and do something :)

Making the Impossible Possible

Dr. Amen talks about the ANTS in your head (automatic negative thoughts) and suggests getting them out of your head, and replacing them. Carol Tuttle has a similar approach that she used, to do something that she originally never thought possible. She ran a marathon... which then led to 15 marathons!
http://thecarolblog.com/how-to-make-the-impossible-possible/

The basic idea with all of these is when you have a negative thought or belief, do something to get the thought out of your head (this helps recognize when it's an irrational thought, or one contrary to your values), and then replace it with a positive belief. Here's some excerpts

Have you ever wanted to accomplish something BIG…yet believed there was no way on earth you could possibly do it?

Years ago, if you had told me I was going to complete a full marathon, I would not have believed you.

The thought of running 26.2 miles at one time was inconceivable to me. It truly overwhelmed and scared me. I believed there was no way I could do something like that.

Yet deep within me there was a desire to collapse those limiting beliefs and take on the challenge to believe that I could do it.

If there’s something blocking you from your future accomplishment, here’s the energy clearing process I used in order to go from “No, I can’t” to an unwavering “Yes I can…and I did!”

.....

First, I had to acknowledge my limiting belief, and then challenge it with another possibility and choice.

Identifying and then clearing your limiting beliefs helps you open up your energy so you can “open up” to the possibility of creating your desired outcome.

For me, the next step meant taking some kind of action in the direction of my goal. I was not going to become a marathon runner by remaining in bed saying affirmations.

....

 Since I was a beginning marathon runner, I chose to start with run-walk intervals and run for 9 minutes followed by a 1-minute walk.

During those 1-minute intervals I incorporated my “energy clearing sessions.” These are the phrases I repeated:

• Even though I can’t believe I am doing this, I am excited to take on the challenge.

• Even though it scares me that I may die trying, I am letting go of the fear.

As my distance began to increase week by week, I included statements like:

• Even though I don’t feel like getting up so early and running so far, I am staying true to my goal.

• Even though I don’t feel like running right now, I am committed to the outcome.

Give this a try next time you have something difficult or scary to do. I practiced this week for a presentation I made to a group of business intelligence engineers. Feeling the familiar butterflies in my stomach before it started, I grabbed some post it notes and jotted down what thoughts were popping in my head. I made notes next to those thoughts, to point out irrational beliefs, and challenge them. Then I crumpled up the note and threw it away. This was symbolic for me and my brain that I'm getting rid of those thoughts. The presentation went well, and I was more at ease. Give it a try!

Wired for Caring

Are people inherently good or bad? This is a fascinating video on how our brains are wired to show compassion and caring for others.

http://www.medicaldaily.com/human-brain-hardwired-acts-kindness-vagus-nerve-activated-during-empathy-313020

Acquiring sympathy is actually an intrinsic component of our being. When we feel physical pain a part of our brain lights up. The same happens when we see someone in physical pain. It’s as if we’re hardwired to have the imagine ourselves experiencing what others go through, which is otherwise known as empathy. “It engages the frontal lobes, these newer regions of the cortex that are involved in more complex symbolic processes like language and imagining the future,” Keltner said.

...

Unfortunately, researchers have found compassion can also be blocked by other factors like money. Keltner says when images of suffering are shown to the less fortunate (economically), they have a vagus nerve response. This response is not seen among individuals with a lot of acquired wealth. It is believed lots of wealth actually yields a compassion deficit in certain individuals. Keltner finds impoverished communities actually give more and have an enormous strength in comparison to their financially well off counterparts.

While 60 percent of what we do is really about maximizing our personal gratification and desire, 40 percent of the time we do things for other people, and we sacrifice and risk exploitation. Helping others and doing random acts of kindness releases endorphins in our brain that help us feel good, and can even mimic a “runner’s high.” After all, generosity is actually contagious and kindness spreads like wildfire. Keltner says all it really requires is redefining human self-interest. 

Talking Back to Yourself

http://docamen.tumblr.com/post/104706414639/dont-believe-every-stupid-thought-you-have

Tame Inner Child

You know that little voice in your head that's always talking? If you just thought, "What voice?"...then THAT's the voice. Have you noticed how often it's not your friend? How often it tells you negative, harmful things that don't help you with your goals? Psychologist call it negative self talk. At least to some degree, I believe the thoughts come from Satan. Regardless of where it originates, negative thoughts are counter productive and often harmful.

Strategy

Dr. Amen has a simple strategy, that's immediately actionable. Any time you feel sad, mad, nervous or out of control, write down the thoughts you're having, to get them out of your head. Writing it down makes the distortions and irrational thinking more obvious. You can then catch those thoughts, before they do damage, and even talk back to it! Don't let that voice tell you what to do! You're in charge, not it!

Give it a try, and let me know if it works for you!!

21 Day Happiness Challenge

This is a routine I'm going to try for 21 days, leading up to Christmas
Anyone else in?
Everyday, for 21 days do the following:
1. Write 3 new things you're grateful for - Helps rewire the brain to scan for good, rather than bad
2. Write in a journal, and include one positive thing that's happened in the last 24 hours
3. Excercise - Among the many benefits, also teaches the brain the importance of behaviors
4. Meditation - Helps to focus on one thing, to combat our cultural adhd and attempting to do many things at once
5. 1 random act of kindness a day

Shawn Achor: The happy secret to better work

Morality & Oxytocin

In previous posts I've talked about Oxytocin as one of our happy chemicals. And how using that, as opposed to dopamine, for dealing with difficult times in life is a healthier approach.
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-athletes-way/201211/the-neurochemicals-happiness

3. Oxytocin: “The Bonding Molecule” Oxytocin is a hormone directly linked to human bonding and increasing trust and loyalty.  In some studies, high levels of oxytocin have been correlated with romanticattachment. Some studies show if a couple is separated for a long period of time, the lack of physical contact reduces oxytocin and drives the feeling of longing to bond with that person again. But there is some debate as to whether oxytocin has the same effect on men as it does on women. In men, vasopressin (a close cousin to oxytocin) may actually be the “bonding molecule.” But again, the bottom line is that skin-to-skin contact, affection, love making and intimacy are key to feeling happy.

Paul Zak, a neuroeconomist, has done some fascinating studies involving oxytocin. This first video tells a story about a terminally ill boy and his father. Those listening to the story had increased levels of cortisol (stress hormone) and oxytocin (empathy). What was interesting was he found people to be more charitable with the increase in oxytocin.

Oxytocin is tied to trust. If you can produce more oxytocin, you'll be more trusting and trustworthy. And ultimately more happy.

This next video delves more into oxytocin and its relationship to morality. He makes a lot of fascinating points in the video, so just watch it. But one funny study he did was taking oxytocin levels at a wedding. I don't know who would have agreed to that! But he found super high oxytocin in people at the wedding in concentric circles around the bride. HA!

The take away from all of this? His simple solution for producing more oxytocin.... hugs. In fact he says 8 hugs a day. Simple enough. So next time you're having a bad day, instead of hopping on your phone for a dopamine hit, or indulging in some unhealthy habit... find someone to hug. 

Praising Ability vs Effort

http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/29/carol-dweck-mindset/

I have this book sitting at home, but haven't started it yet. I found this study to be particularly interesting and applicable.

Dweck and her colleagues gave each ten fairly challenging problems from a nonverbal IQ test, then praised the student for his or her performance — most had done pretty well. But they offered two types of praise: Some students were told “Wow, you got [X many] right. That’s a really good score. You must be smart at this,” while others, “Wow, you got [X many] right. That’s a really good score. You must have worked really hard.” In other words, some were praised for ability and others for effort. The findings, at this point, are unsurprising yet jarring:

What’s so alarming is that we took ordinary children and made them into liars, simply by telling them they were smart.

Guess I should start doing Yoga.....

This is another great explanation of the 'happy chemicals' our brains and bodies use to make us feel good.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-athletes-way/201211/the-neurochemicals-happiness

One thing that stood out is the section on GABA. In the Sons of Helaman and Eternal Warriors classes, we learn how to use GABA to control our limbic system, so we can stick to our goals and values.  It's interesting to see that Yoga can help us produce GABA as well. This goes along well with one of my previous posts on using meditation to 'fire up the left frontal lobe', where happiness resides. So I guess i should take up yoga and meditation to help in staying prefrontal :)

5. GABA: “The Anti-Anxiety Molecule” GABA is an inhibitory molecule that slows down the firing of neurons and creates a sense of calmness. You can increase GABA naturally by practicing yoga,meditation or “The Relaxation Response.”  Benzodiazepines (Such as Valium and Xanax) are sedatives that work as anti-anxiety medication by increasing GABA. These drugs have many side effects and risks of dependency but are still widely prescribed. 

A study from the "Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine" found a 27% increase in GABA levels among yoga practitioners after a 60-minute yoga session when compared against participants who read a book for 60 minutes. The study suggests yoga might increase GABA levels naturally.

'Cause you've had a bad day...'

Just a clarification right up front. I like donuts... this isn't a rip on donuts post. Nor ripping on the company that put up the ad. BUT, sometimes there's sneaky messages (especially from advertising and politicians) that you notice when paying attention... Are donuts really a good place to go for handling a bad day and bad emotions?

In the Eternal Warriors class you learn about the build up of negative feelings and how that leaves you susceptible to temptations to alleviate the pain. When you've had a bad day, do you turn to things that are contrary to your values (I value a healthy diet, but I FEEL like eating a whole package of oreos)? Do you turn to short term fixes, that leave you feeling more empty after (dopamine)? This donut could be replaced with drugs, video games, porn, sugar... or my favorite. Mountain Dew :)

Watch for messages encouraging you to listen with your limbic ears, rather than your prefrontal lobe. 

:)

Science of Happy

https://www.lds.org/church/news/the-surprising-science-behind-supremely-happy-people?lang=eng&cid=facebook-shared

“Through MRI technology over the last 10 years, brain scans have become absolutely wonderful,” said Brother Smith. “Your frontal lobe is where happiness is located.” When someone is really sad, the right side of the frontal lobe lights up. And when someone is happy, the left part of the frontal lobe lights up. Happiness and sadness occur in different places of the brain.

Speaking about things that help the left frontal lobe come alive, Brother Smith said, “Meditation will fire up the left frontal lobe and flood your brain with dopamine.” There are 100 billion neurons in a person’s brain, and they talk to each other. To talk to each other they need neurotransmitters or chemicals. The three that make a person happy are norepinephrine, serotonin, and dopamine. Low levels of these chemicals may make a person unhappy. Returning them to normal levels may help some people.

I was reading a book called Mindsight, that talks about some of this neuroscience. In an oversimplified explanation, feelings  generated by the limbic system move through the right side of the brain, to the left. It's interesting that happiness would be in the prefrontal cortex. So many of the negative emotions that leave us susceptible to temptation come from the limbic system, overriding our higher cortical thinking.

Brains, Technology & Dopamine

Here's a follow up article on the same topic of dopamine...

http://www.glennbeck.com/2014/07/29/what-happens-to-our-brains-when-we-become-dependent-on-technology/

“We know that just like alcohol, gambling, nicotine that we know our cell phones release a burst of dopamine.  And so again a little bit of alcohol is fine too much alcohol is what’s dangerous.  Some gambling is fine.  Too much is dangerous.  Our cell phones are great they’re wonderful machines, but out of balance like all addiction, eventually we will waste resources, waste time and destroy relationships,” Simon said.

Have you ever seen a couple out at a restaurant where both people are on their phones and ignoring one another? That’s a sign of an unhealthy addition to technology.

“ (Smart phones) have addictive qualities and so the concern is that, as teenagers, as they go through adolescence, like alcohol, they have social media and they have their phones and theyaccidentally are forming neural connections, where when they’re going through times of stress and they should be relying on each other, they are turning to machines,” Simon said.

“The fear is that that will develop to addictions and it will exaggerate as we move forward into time.  We are already starting to see a rise in suicides, for example.  I mean, this affects all generations,” he added. ”  The CDC announced about a year ago that more Boomers now die from suicide than car accidents.  In other words, what we’re seeing is a rise of loneliness and isolation.  No one kills themselves when they are hungry.  We kill ourselves when we’re lonely.  In the 1960s, there were one school shooting.  In the 1980s, there were 27.  In the 1990s, there were 58.  In the past decade, there have been over 120.  It has nothing to do with guns.  It has to do with people feeling lonely.”

“The gun lobby and the anti-gun lobby, however they want to define themselves, would best serve society instead of throwing rocks at each other sat, down together and figure out how do we combat the loneliness that people are feeling. 70 percent of the school shooters were born after the year 1980, most of them are about 15 years old.  All of them attacked people within their own community and attack the people they blamed responsible for their own loneliness.”

“I may hug you,” Glenn said. “Thank you for actually saying that.  Something is missing in us.  There have been guns forever.  A kid in the 1960s could go and buy a gun, they didn’t use it.”

“Just recently UC Santa Barbara the shootings there, that kid may made those horribly chilling videos. He felt lonely and isolated because he was a virgin and he sought to find comfort on online support groups.  There is no online support group that can give you the same warmth and comfort and security than real, human, loving relationships.  And you see it’s chilling how he makes this video, how he’s excited, he’s actually excited to go shoot up the sorority, the people he blames for his sense of loneliness and isolation, because it’s the first time he feels a sense of control over his own life,” Simon added.

Simon pointed to the Twelve Step program for alcoholics, and how the final step is help another alcoholic, as an example of the importance of human relationships.

“You know, we have an entire on the bookshelf called self-help we have no section on the bookshelf called help others.  We have become all about ourselves and yet the amazing thing if you want to find the job you love, help somebody find the job they love.  If you want to find somebody they love, help someone who is looking for love.  If you want do find happiness, help somebody else who is looking.  That’s how we do it.  And it feels so good when we do that that it actually encourages us to want to do it more.  We are built for service and when we create — this is the point of leadership.  When we create environments in which we feel safe amongst each other we will look after each other, when we create environments in which we fear each other, we will work to our own interests, we will being paranoid, cynical mistrustful of leadership, and it’s a lonely existence,” Simon said.

What's your 'go to' happy chemical?

This is an interesting article on some of the 'feel good' chemicals our brain produces.

http://www.glennbeck.com/2014/07/29/are-human-beings-biologically-designed-to-be-good/

“So in our brains, in our bodies, there is a system of chemical rewards so when we do things we get a feeling of doing those things that is designed to reward behavior that is in our best interest.  There’s four chemicals that are mainly responsible for all the good feelings that we would have,” Simon explained. “So any kinds of feelings of happiness, joy, success, friendship, trust, love, loyalty can basically be boiled down to endorphins, dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin.”

Simon explained, “Dopamine is something you get when you accomplish something you set out do accomplish so that feeling when you get when you cross off something off your to do list the feeling find something on Google or eBay.  Nobody goes to Google and types in things you’re not looking for.  We have something in mind.  We type it in and the feeling of there it is, that’s dopamine.  Dopamine is also the feeling you get when you win the game.  Yes, that sort of fantastic, we did it.  Or when you feel like you’re making progress.  So that’s why they put mile-markers — if you ran a race without mile-markers it’s actually unnerving so dopamine helps us feel like we’re making progress.  It’s the reason we’re achievement machines.”

“The problem with dopamine is it doesn’t last.  It comes in hits,” he said. 

While dopamine doesn’t last and leave people with strong feelings of accomplishment, the chemicals serotonin and oxytocin are what do last and are what Simon calls “social chemicals”.

“This is the importance — what you’re talking about is the solution to the imbalance of dopamine.  Right?  Which is these other beautiful, beautiful chemicals called serotonin and oxytocin.  Broadly speaking these two chemicals are the selfless chemicals.  They are the social chemicals.  These are the chemicals that reward us — it’s the feeling of trust.  It’s the feeling offriendship.  It’s the reason we like spending time with our friends.  It’s the reason we’d rather sit next to someone that we know and we leave a blank space at the movies because we don’t want to sit next to somebody we don’t know.  That feeling of safety.  That comes from these other two beautiful chemicals and the most important thing about those chemicals is they last.  They take a while to build up.  It takes time to build up trust, but they last,” he said. 

“Now the great thing about serotonin — one of the ways in which we get oxytocin — and there’s a whole bunch.  Oxytocin is the warm and fuzzies.  One of the ways we get it is generosity. Acts of kindness.  Giving of your time and energy with no expectation of return.  Money doesn’t count.  Time and energy,” he explained.

Simon explained that if he goes online and donates a $1,000 to charity, he gets a very different feeling than if he spent a whole weekend afternoon painting a school. While a $1,000 may go further than his physical labor, it is a different mental reward.

When we're having a difficult moment, dopamine is a fast, easy treatment, but doesn't last very long. There's nothing wrong with dopamine, but if it becomes the long term strategy for dealing with emotional pain, we'll find ourselves back in the same situation very quickly. Not to mention we're following a pattern that can lead to turning to addictive sources of dopamine (porn, drugs etc).

My dad's best friend growing up was the local pin ball champ of the small town where they were growing up. Old timers didn't like him 'wasting his time' on things like that. They seemed to sense that the level of involvement wasn't healthy, even if they didn't know the science behind it. I suspect he was getting dopamine hits that were helping him deal with issues from his family. Soon it went from pinball into porn, and later to drugs.

Activities that produce dopamine aren't bad, but I think it's helpful to keep in mind what happens if we don't moderate, or if we're using dopamine for emotional comfort. IMHO a better solution, where possible would be to do service and to interact with loved ones. This will lead to closer interpersonal connections and helps keep your prefrontal cortex in charge of your life.

Micro-habits

One of the strategies employed in the Eternal Warriors and Sons of Helaman programs is to set up behavior goals, which you work towards until you can get 28 perfect days to establish a habit. In doing these daily behaviors, one must choose what they value, over what they feel like. I like the concept of a micro habit from this article.
http://www.artofmanliness.com/2014/10/22/how-to-create-habits-that-stick-giveaway/

Step 1: Create A “Micro-habit” That Helps Achieve Your Big Goal

Not all habits are created equal – and some require much more cognitive power than others.

Simple habits like making breakfast in the morning require relatively few steps: Take out bowl. Pour cereal. Pour milk. Eat.

More complex habits are combinations of several simple habits. Consider all the automation that goes into driving a car. You don’t need to think about how to operate a car because the behaviors are so deeply embedded that it becomes a habit, but it’s actually a fairly complex process.

Think about it:

• You have to get to your car, open the door, and get in.
• You adjust your mirrors and your seat.
• You put on your seat belt.
• You start the car, and use complex spacial awareness of distance and time to leave your driveway…backwards.
• You start driving (even more steps if the car is a stick shift).
• You navigate your destination mentally, or you use part of your brain to both look and listen while a GPS directs you.
• You have to move in speed and synchronicity with other cars. And the occasional idiotic motorcyclist with a death wish.
• Don’t forget to put on your turn signal.
• All this while the radio is playing. And you’re on the phone making dinner plans.

And when you get to work, you don’t even remember how you got there.

So how do we intentionally automate these processes to make even complex tasks less daunting?

In my case, what was the secret to making myself get to the gym?

Rather than try to force myself every day, I simply created a “micro-habit” that I knew would lead to the intended behavior. A micro-habit is a single, tiny action that necessarily leads to a bigger action.

If you want to floss your teeth, just floss one tooth. Commit to flossing just ONE tooth — and make that your goal for the day. If you are able to do that, you’ve accomplished your goal. You can check it off your list.

But here’s the trick: Once you perform the micro-habit enough times, it becomes much harder NOT to complete the entire habit than to simply do the whole thing.

In order to ensure that I got to the gym, my micro-habit was simply to swipe my card at the the entrance.

That’s it. Just swipe.

I picked a gym that was on my way back from work and every time I passed it, all I had to do was walk upstairs and swipe my card. After that, if I wanted to, I could go home.

Funny enough, it worked almost immediately. Some days, all I could do was swipe the card and leave. But 90% of the time I found myself saying, “Well…I’m already here…might as well just walk on the treadmill or something.”

An hour later, I’d completed the workout, and it was entirely because of the micro-habit, which took almost zero effort.

What micro-habit could you try?

If you want to run every morning, maybe you keep your running shoes by the bed and simply commit to putting them on in the morning.

If you want to write more, maybe you commit to writing just five words on a sheet of paper every day with breakfast.

If you want to read more, maybe you commit to just reading one paragraph and putting the book down.

It’s totally fine if all you can do is your micro-habit. But you’ll find that more often than not you end up doing much more.

I used this micro-habit formula to build motivation, and then I enlisted the help of an objective accountability partner to check in with daily to ensure that I stayed on track.

The Science Behind Procrastination

To further illustrate prefrontal cortex vs the limbic system, here's an example of how it works with procrastination
http://www.realsimple.com/work-life/life-strategies/time-management/procrastination

Science explains Charlie Brown’s seesaw sensibility as a fight that is sparked between two parts of the mind when it’s faced with a distasteful activity: a battle of the limbic system (the unconscious zone that includes the pleasure center) and the prefrontal cortex (the internal “planner”). When the limbic system wins, and that’s pretty often, the result is putting off for tomorrow what could (and should) be done today.

Here’s a bit more scientific backup, so you can stop blaming yourself (or your parents, your birth sign, the weather) and start chalking up procrastination to biology. The limbic system, one of the oldest and most dominant portions of the brain, is on automatic. It tells you to, say, pull your hand away from a flame—and also to flee from unpleasant tasks. In other words, it directs you to opt for “immediate mood repair,” explains Timothy A. Pychyl, Ph.D., a psychology professor at Carleton University, in Ottawa, and the author of The Procrastinator’s Digest: A Concise Guide to Solving the Procrastination Puzzle ($16, amazon.com).

The prefrontal cortex is a newer and weaker portion of the brain. It’s what allows you to integrate information and make decisions. “This is the part of the brain that really separates humans from animals, who are just controlled by stimulus,” says Pychyl. The prefrontal cortex, located immediately behind the forehead (where we tap when we’re trying to think, dammit, think), gets the job done. But there’s nothing automatic about its function. You must kick it into gear (“I have to sit down and write this book report!”). And the moment you’re not consciously engaged in a task, your limbic system takes over. You give in to what feels good—you procrastinate.