Research shows that on average, it takes 66 days for a new behavior to become automatic. Some habits take longer – six months or more. But 66 days is roughly how long it takes for the average habit to stick.
The problem? Most people give up on their new habit in the first week or two.
Why? Because human nature makes us short-sighted. We undervalue long-term rewards compared to short-term wins. This explains why we ditch habits right as they start delivering results. The plateau kicks in and we lose motivation right when we should double down.
Understanding this tendency and why habits take so long to form is critical to breaking through that frustration period.
The Learning Curve: How Long It Really Takes to Form a Habit
Let’s take a closer look at what’s happening behind the scenes when you start a new habit. Scientists refer to this as the learning curve – how your performance changes with practice over time.
In the early days, you have to put in a lot of conscious focus and effort. Remember when you first started driving? You were hyper aware of every turn, pedal and lever. Over time, driving became second nature.
That’s what the learning curve tracks – the transition of a behavior from effortful practice to automatic mastery. It always follows the same trajectory: steep improvement upfront that incremental gains over time.
Here is an example learning curve for a new exercise habit:
You can see the effort required drops quickly in the first few weeks before leveling off. But ultimately, it takes months for a habit to become second nature. This example shows someone mastering a new workout, but the curve is the same for any habit.
So if habits take months to form, why do most people flounder after a few weeks? The problem lies in the gap between expectation and reality. Our brain rewards immediate gratification, but habits pay off delayed.
Why Instant Gratification Holds Us Back
Human nature evolved in environments where rewards were immediately tied to actions. You were hungry, you hunted, you ate. The feedback was quick.
Habits like exercise break from this mold. You work out today, but don’t lose the weight for months. Our brains still crave the instant result though. When we want something now, delayed gratification rarely wins out.
So when you’re in the gym sweating it out and don’t see results in the mirror, motivation takes a hit. The time lag between action and reward is where people bail on habits.
What we need to realize is that transformation is gradual. Every habit follows the SAME trajectory: small gains building on each other continuously over time. The learning curve never fails.
But because the improvements come slowly, we don’t think change is happening. That’s what the Plateau of Latent Potential is all about…
The Plateau of Latent Potential
Imagine an ice cube placed in a room at 25 degrees. You slowly increase the temperature – 26 degrees, 27 degrees, but nothing is changing. Then suddenly at 32 degrees, the ice begins melting rapidly.
This analogy perfectly explains the delay we see with results in any habit. You’re putting in the work daily for weeks, but not getting anywhere. It’s not until months later that the rewards from your efforts seem to appear overnight.
The delay occurs because habits unfold in stages. First, you practice to improve performance. Then, performance improvement accumulates into meaningful results.
Take weight loss for example. You go to the gym daily for a month before you can lift slightly heavier weights. After three months, all the muscle gain allows you to increase your calorie burn during your workout. After six months, your metabolism has ramped up enough from the muscle to steadily drop pounds.
Change occurs in one order – practice first, results second – but we want it the other way around. We expect results to materialize before putting in the work, when it happens in reverse.
Identity Change Is What Finally Locks in Good Habits
After months of rehearsing a habit, you eventually become a different person. Your self-image aligns with your actions. Exercising isn’t just something you do, it’s WHO YOU ARE.
This is key – because once a habit becomes part of your identity, it sticks for good. Now you do it effortlessly as part of your core being. No more dragging yourself to the gym or forcing activity because your new self CRAVES the workout.
That’s why intrinsic motivation is so powerful. With enough repetition, your habits shape your identity for you subconsciously. This saves you from continually resisting temptation or forcing motivation day after day just to stay on track. Who you are pulls you toward the habit automatically.
But getting to that phase takes many microscopic wins. That’s why tiny gains compound so powerfully over time…
The Power of “Atomic Habits” and 1% Daily Improvements
Habits experts talk about something called atomic habits – these tiny, seemingly insignificant improvements that make an enormous difference over time.
Think getting 1% better each day. That sounds easy enough, right? But within one year, you’d be 37 times better. Meanwhile, getting 1% worse daily would basically ruin you. This illustrates the power of tiny gains accruing continuously, even if we don’t realize it in the moment.
This relates directly to the delayed outcomes we see with habit change. Going to the gym for a month probably won’t lead to six pack abs. But it WILL make regular training a bit easier and a bit more enjoyable than before. A bit more muscle here, slightly higher endurance there… minor gains that pave the way for more improvement later.
After a year of those marginal wins, you have drastically shifted the trajectory. Suddenly you stand out, almost like an overnight transformation. Atomic habits drive this gradual-but-inevitable rise. Tiny daily actions control the direction of our lives over time.
Now we need to make those small wins as consistent as possible on the journey to making a habit stick for good…
Consistency Beats Intensity with Habits
One big mistake people make is assuming more effort now will drive faster results. So you amp up intensity on a habit for a few weeks before burning out. Sound familiar?
This aggressive push ignores the entire premise of habit change – tiny gains stacking up over time. You can’t rush the process or make up for it later by working twice as hard. Consistency rules all.
Remember, you only fail a habit if you stop practicing it altogether. The learning curve never fails – gains will come automatically so long as you stick with it. Going hard isn’t necessary if you can go long and steady.
Making small milestones inevitable along the way keeps motivation high even when results seem invisible. This about adjusting your environment and schedule to make habits ridiculously easy to initiate. The Two-Minute Rule helps here…
The Two-Minute Rule for Habit Change
The Two-Minute Rule states that “When you start a new habit, it should take less than two minutes to do.” This idea comes from the great coach Bill Walsh, who used it with his championship football teams.
It’s a sneaky mental trick because although two minutes seems tiny, it ensures you follow through consistently. Missing your habit suddenly feels unacceptable when it’s so easy to stick with. “I couldn’t even do my two minutes today? Pathetic.”
More importantly, it stops procrastination. No opportunity arises to put the task off when it’s so fast anyway. Removing any need to delay or decide makes action automatic. Tiny actions compound over time, so the Two-Minute Rule proves to be a game changer.
It’s also very flexible. Take meditation for example. Sticking with twenty minutes daily may seem daunting. But starting with one breath? Simple. After a few weeks, once you become the type of person who meditates daily, ramping up session length feels natural.
You can apply this to nearly any habit. “Read before bed each night” becomes “read one page.” “Do yoga for an hour” becomes “take out my yoga mat.” The Two-Minute Rule eases habits into your life before gradually expanding them.
Time Magnifies the Effects of Tiny Gains
We end up underrating early progress due to a failure of imagination more than anything. If I asked you, “Would you rather have $100 today or $120 in 5 years?” it’s obvious $100 now wins out. Your mind fails to properly consider how compound growth expands our results in the long run.
Yet over decades, that 20% annual return becomes nearly 10 times greater than taking the quick cash. We underestimate the future multiplying power of very slight gains made consistently, day after day, simply due to lack of vision. With enough time, atomic habits create exponential change.
This explains why habits you learn as a youth pay dividends for your entire lifetime. And why in any endeavor, from business, to sports, to art – the people with momentum coming in reap rewards down the road. Their trajectory carries them much farther, even if they don’t stand out yet.
It all stems back to the power of those small victories. And time allowed to run its course.
The Plateau is Temporary, But Quitting Can Be Permanent
By now, I hope you realize that not seeing benefits from your shiny new habit a few weeks or months in is completely normal. You aren’t failing or doing anything wrong necessarily. You’ve just hit that inevitable plateau on the road toward mastering this behavior for good.
Understand this is temporary. Consistency WILL deliver the change and identity shift you’re working toward. But only if you allow time on your side to perform its magic.
Alternatively, quitting is what makes a habit “not work” for you permanently. Giving in to frustration only serves to reinforce that you couldn’t cut it. Creating an identity that aligns with falling short rather than winning in the end.
Breaking through is a waiting game requiring patience above all else. Just realize that hundreds of days where nothing seems different will add up to something very different over hundreds MORE days to come. Your task is to simply stick with the process. Master the two minutes today, and improvements will unveil themselves eventually.
The transformation won’t happen overnight because it CAN’T when forging new identity and skill sets. But boy, when it kicks into gear, people will think you changed overnight! Once established, habits continually get better, easier, and more satisfying automatically. You just need to put in enough time first for the magic to operate.
So lower your expectations around how soon you should see success with any habit change endeavor. Commit to a little bit of practice as perfectly as possible going forward. If you want to cement a habit for life, leave the intensity for later. Simply focus on repeating the basics and that desired behavior WILL get locked in over time.
The rest takes care of itself.
