People ask me why I take cold showers regularly, post to my blog daily, and never miss my burpee-based twice-daily calisthenics over more than a decade (approaching 150,000 cumulative burpees).
Among many reasons, developing the skill to do what I said I would is tremendously valuable. Without these habits, I lacked discipline and thought to avoid tricks, which I thought of as short-term cheats. The habits developed discipline in me and revealed that developing tricks is the way to make habits work.
I have no doubt that the most accomplished people use tricks to do their most valuable activities -- athletes, politicians, business leaders, whatever.
Things like if I want to run but am feeling lazy, I put on my running shoes and clothes, which means I'll eventually run. To put on the shoes is trivial, but it works to get me on a run, however long.
Before I lift weights, I mop the floor since some of my exercises put me on the ground. Mopping is easy and makes lifting automatic. For some reason, once I mop, I automatically transition to lifting.
Starting my burpees took years of experimenting on what would avoid my standing there intending to start, but not starting. Counting down or up didn't work. What worked was committing to starting on the next breath. Now I pace all my calisthenics by breath.
These are examples of little things I found that if I do them, I do the big things. As far as I can tell, the way to find tricks that work is to keep doing the activity until a trick that works emerges.
Among many reasons, developing the skill to do what I said I would is tremendously valuable. Without these habits, I lacked discipline and thought to avoid tricks, which I thought of as short-term cheats. The habits developed discipline in me and revealed that developing tricks is the way to make habits work.
I have no doubt that the most accomplished people use tricks to do their most valuable activities -- athletes, politicians, business leaders, whatever.