Austin Scholar #136: How to teach your kids habit-building
& the magic of making your bed
Hey, y'all!
This week from Austin Scholar...
Austin’s Anecdote: The magic of making your bed
How to teach your kids habit-building
Scholar’s Sources: What I’ve been thinking about…
If I wasn’t officially a college student before, I definitely am now: last week I got the freshman flu. It didn’t last for a long time – I only had a fever for half of a day, yet I still got so behind on everything.
I found myself getting super anxious about my school work and my ability to succeed at such a rigorous school. But instead of letting myself wallow in my obsessive thoughts, I got myself out of bed and hung out with my friends before locking in and getting back on track. Talking to the people going through the same thing calmed me down and helped to clear my head :)
Austin’s Anecdote: The magic of making your bed
I make my bed every single morning.
I don’t do it because I want to keep my room clean or because I read those motivational books about why it’s important to make your bed in the morning to set yourself up for success.
I make my bed every morning because it’s been a habit since I was in fifth grade.
One of the requirements at Alpha was to complete a “stick-to-it-ness” goal, where you complete a habit every day without fail for thirty days.
I chose to make my bed every day. I set my alarm five minutes earlier (a tiny Austin couldn’t make her bed as easily as she can today – there were a lot of stuffed animals to organize) and made my bed immediately after it went off.
As simple as the task sounds, a lot of mornings (especially in the beginning), I would hate that I had to wake up earlier. I felt like it was such an arduous task to hoist my blankets off the ground and onto the bed – and my perfectionist side needed everything to look exactly the same every morning.
Even on the days I woke up late, I had to make my bed, so doing it efficiently it became a priority for me.
Eventually, though, it became an automatic task and I didn’t have to think twice about it. Even this very morning, I woke up to the majestic ringing of my alarm, almost fell out of my lofted bed, pulled up the blankets that had fallen during the night, and lovingly placed my stuffed animal in the center of my pillows.
I honestly don’t think I could stop if I wanted to.
The next stick-to-it-ness goal I did was cook dinner every night to prepare for my build-a-business goal, where I had to make $200 profit from a business. I chose to open a one-night only restaurant and invite all of my friends and their parents. I had a multitude of menu options and had to be ready to make every single one, so each night in the month leading up to restaurant day, I practiced by making dinner for my family.
And although it’s not really in the cards for me to make dinner for myself every night in college (my dining hall serves ice cream with every dinner, so you better believe I’m there for that), I can still make my entire menu from that night as if I’m on autopilot.
This practice with habit building has truly helped me improve my life as a whole – I used it when I started working out, when I started figure skating, when I learned how to french braid my hair, when I started journaling, when I began my morning gratitude journey…and that’s just a fraction of the list. I am a happier, healthier, cleaner, more self-sufficient person because of this skill.
How to teach your kids habit-building
One of the most important things you can do for your kid is teach them how to make a commitment to themselves and stick to it.
If they master this concept early, their high school and college lives will be so much smoother, as they will be able to take small, yet lucrative habits (such as studying a topic for 20 minutes every day after school, working out, journaling, etc.) and implement them with ease.
Of course, most schools don’t have a stick-to-it-ness requirement for their students, so here’s how you can easily do the same exercise for your kid: