Habit Rehab

To Make a New Habit Stick, You Need to Find the Right Motivation

This is part of a five-day Habit Rehab to help you start the year off right

Markham Heid
Published in
2 min readJan 10, 2020

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Illustrations: Kieran Blakey

Day 5:

Motivation is an essential ingredient if you’re trying to form a new habit. But not all forms of motivation are created equal. “We talk about intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, and intrinsic seem to be best,” says Phillippa Lally, a psychologist and senior research fellow at University College London.

In a nutshell, intrinsic motivations are those features of a new behavior that make it appealing to you in and of itself. If you love the idea of being able to play the piano or speak French because practicing and perfecting those skills would give you pleasure, those are examples of intrinsic motivations.

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Elemental
Elemental

Published in Elemental

Elemental is a former publication from Medium for science-backed health and wellness coverage. Currently inactive and not taking submissions.

Markham Heid
Markham Heid

Written by Markham Heid

I’m a frequent contributor at TIME, the New York Times, and other media orgs. I write mostly about health and science. I like long walks and the Grateful Dead.