Ask HN: Are there any systematic and scientific ways to develop a habit?

To develop a habit, you simply need to repeat the specific action, by forcing yourself (apply discipline).

If you do that, your brain will benefit from its (life-long!) property of plasticity and will create new neural connections (with each repetition) which favor the action you're about to execute:

First, you're about to create a new path (like through a thick a forest), which is a bit harder, but then you use that path again and again, and the path will become a street and then a highway (which is increasingly easier to use). In the end, you can execute your action without any effort because your neurological pathways are now really solid and the electrical signals travel much easier.

no there isn't. All the pop 'habit methods' methods like repeating same thing to death over and over 'to form a habit' are bogus.

we need motivation, not habit. There are no shortcuts or hacks for motivation, we have to put in the effort to understand our own brain and what drives it to do things.

as a react practice protect I made habity.io (open source at my github, sry phone) I am currently rewriting a new version of it with some machine learning scheduling stuff e.g. predict what is the most efficient time of day to do stuff based on previous days..(neural net practice idea of mine)

For reading there's this product: https://www.amazon.com/Mark-My-Time-Digital-Bookmark-Neon-Bl... . It's a bookmark that allows you to set any target reading time, and it displays a countdown... You can do the same with your phone eventually, and it might be unpractical to have one per book... I use playing cards as bookmarks. You can read before going to sleep, and make it a habit to read while catching some sleep...

Running/exercising... there are many apps such as Runkeeper and such that allow you to set weekly goals. Running might better in the morning.

Another one is to get a wall calendar in a visible place at home and mark the days where you have been active in whatever habit. If you see no marks it means you have dropped your habit. You can also use a calendar app and set reminders... but those are easy to ignore.

Was it habit or motivation that made you brush your teeth this morning?