Atomic Habits By James Clear — Review and Summary
By: Mikael Haji
Tags: Review, Habit Building, Habits, Atomic Habit, Read

The Fundamentals — The Surprising Power of Atomic Habits

Improving By 1% Every Day

In Atomic Habits, James Clear tells us that improving by just 1% is not always noticeable but can be extremely significant in the long run. The overall concept is that if you can become 1% better every day for 1 year, you’ll end up 37 times better than you were at the beginning of the year. On the other hand, if you become 1% worse every single day, you will hit rock bottom and end up at ~0 by the end of the year. As you can see, just this tiny bit of math shows just how much these little differences can shape our lives. It is only after a year or more that we finally understand the overall value of our good habits and the cost of our bad ones. In the book, Clear gives a notable example of shifting the route of an airplane by just a few degrees. He gives the example of flying from Los Angeles to New York City. If the pilot was to make a small adjustment and turn 3.5 degrees south, the plane would end up in Washington DC, instead of New York City. As you can see, just a small change is barely noticeable when taking off. However, by the end of your ride, you will be hundreds of miles away from your intended destination.

In my opinion, the idea of improving by 1% every day is truly remarkable and rewarding. This is due to the fact that it is a process of continual improvement and not a “one and done” activity. Personally, I was able to apply this concept to a goal I have had for the longest time (meditate every day for 30 minutes). As much as I tried to achieve this goal in the past year, I could never find the time to meditate and lacked the overall motivation to do so. Nonetheless, after reading Atomic Habits, specifically this part of the book, I realized that I didn't have to start off with 30 minutes of meditation. Instead, I decided that I would start my day with just a minute of meditation and then, every single day, add 30 seconds to that time (until I got to 30 minutes). By doing this, I have been able to take on the goal in a slow, steady, and consistent way. In fact, for the last two weeks, I have been able to successfully adopt this process in my daily life (At the time of publication, I am at 8 minutes of meditation every morning after waking up).

If you get 1% better every single day, you will definitely end up with results nearly 37x better after 1 year

A slight change in your daily habits can guide your life to a very different destination. Making a choice that is 1 percent better or 1 percent worse seems insignificant in the moment, but over the span of moments that make up a lifetime these choices determine the difference between who you are and who you could be. Success is the product of daily habits — not once-in-a-lifetime transformations.

What Progress Looks Like

To paint a picture of his conception of progress, James Clear presents the analogy of an ice cube.

If you place an ice cube in a room at -15 degrees. As you slowly increase the temperature of the room degree by degree. From -15° to -14°, the ice cube doesn’t move and remains intact. From -2 to -1, the ice cube still doesn’t melt and remains intact. In contrast, from 0° to 1°, the ice cube begins to melt. A difference of 1 degree has triggered a huge change whereas previously this increase seemed insignificant.

This analogy is exactly like our habits. Sometimes change takes quite a long time. Sometimes change requires persistent effort. Nonetheless, in both situations, you must trust that you will eventually see your hard work paying off.

Systems > Goals

Personally, I am the type of person who ends up being too caught up in the notion of the goal itself versus the actual process. Nevertheless, after reading Atomic Habits by James Clear, I think it is safe to say that I have started to achieve more by actually bringing more attention to the actual process. Now, you might be wondering what exactly the difference between a system and a goal is. While goals are the desired result that a person or group wants, a system is an overall process that leads to your wanted outcome. Therefore, in short, goals give you a direction, but systems help you make progress.

In Atomic Habits, Clear describes the 4 upmost problems that occur when an individual focuses on a goal. This includes;

Winners and losers have the same goals

Reaching a goal is only a momentary change

The goal restricts your level of happiness

The goal is at odds with long-term progress

Most of the time, if you are having problems with changing your habits, the problem is not you, but your overall system.

You don’t rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems.

One of the core themes of Atomic Habits was the overall concept of valuing the overall system, rather than one specific goal. Personally, I tend to be an extremely goal-oriented individual as I always focus on results. However, in the last two weeks, I have set out to become more of a system-oriented person by diverting my attention to the process. For example, one goal I have had is to increase my running endurance. Rather than focusing on my goal, I decided to create a system that allowed me to run a 5k every single day without fail.