Have you ever noticed that the environment you’re in affects the way you feel and act?
For instance, think about how you act at work compared to how you act in your bedroom. Or how you act at a library versus a crowded amusement park.
So, if you want to change the way you feel or cultivate new habits, a great way to do that is by changing up your environment.
Crushing new goals and feeling like a new you starts with a new environment!
And the best part is, even small changes to your environment can help it feel like a new place.
My experience in Italy
I learned about the importance of my environment by happenstance, but I’ve since learned to manufacture new environments in my life when I want to turn over a new leaf or start a new habit.
I quit social media cold turkey at the same time I had another major life event: I moved to Italy.
I had just finished my graduate degree, and I decided to fulfill a bucket list item and teach English at a public school in the beautiful Italian countryside.
It was a time where the OLD me would have been tempted to post pictures on Facebook daily of the amazing things I was seeing and experiencing.
But, as it happened, I can pinpoint that period of time as when I completely quit using social media.
It wasn’t just that I decided to stop using it (although that was the important first step).
What made it easy to quit it completely, all at once, was that my environment had changed.
Because I was in a completely new place, it was easy to become a new version of myself – one with better habits.
I lived in a different environment (specifically, in the upstairs bedroom of my amazing host family’s house) that gave me different environmental cues. It was easy to form new habits, because I wasn’t in the place where I had formed those bad habits in the first place.
For example, back home in my apartment, I was used to keeping my phone by my bed and using it after I woke up in the morning and before I went to sleep at night.
In my new environment, I decided to put my phone on my desk, which was across the room from my bed.
Besides obvious changes like that, being in a new environment prompted some sort of internal change in me. I felt like a new person, and I could be whoever I wanted to be.
Once you realize that you can change your environment, you realize that you can change yourself.
How can I change my environment to build better habits?
Now, you don’t have to move to another country to change your environment. Once you change your mindset, you can change your environment to match, and even small changes can make you feel drastically different.
There are two types of changes you can make to your environment – aesthetic changes and functional changes.
Aesthetic changes change the look of what you see visually. Even if these changes don’t affect your environment in a functional way, they can still have a major impact on your mood and your mindset.
Here are some simple ways to change your environment aesthetically:
Clean and organize your spaces (especially your bedroom) – Tidying up an area can have such an effect on how you feel! And your bedroom is the best place to start, since it’s where you begin and end the day.
Rearrange furniture – Moving your couch so it’s facing the opposite wall can make a HUGE difference in how a room feels.
Paint – If you’ve been wanting an excuse to change the color of your walls, why not go for it? Painting can completely change the mood of a room and make you feel shiny and new inside.
Hang a picture or sign on the wall – This is one of the simplest changes of all. Put up a pretty painting, a photo of your family, or an inspiring quote.
Clear off your workspace – If you work at a desk, whether at home or in an office, try clearing everything off except for what you need at the moment, and see how different it makes you feel.
Display something to help you remember your goals – Studies have shown that writing down your goals and placing them somewhere you can see them often increases the likelihood that you’ll achieve them!
Besides a list of your goals, you can make an object represent your commitment to your goals. It could be as simple as a sticker on your mirror or a figurine on your nightstand. Whatever it is, you can assign meaning to it so that it reminds you of what you’re working on.
I love making aesthetic changes to my environment because they make me feel like a new person. Making these types of changes reminds me that I’m in control of many parts of my life, including my habits.
Functional changes don’t only make a visual change, but a change to how you interact with your environment. You can modify your surroundings to make them more conducive to the goals you want to reach.
Here are some simple ways to change your environment functionally:
Keep electronics out of arm’s reach from your bed – If you want to get better sleep and have smoother mornings, don’t keep your phone or tablet where you can reach for it first thing in the morning and last thing before going to sleep.
Find a new place for your phone to charge (maybe outside of your bedroom) – Give your phone a nice new home where it can happily stay all night without distracting you.
Put things that go together, together – Put your headphones on top of your workout clothes so that it makes it easy to go running. Put your keys on top of a Tupperware full of vegetables so that you don’t forget to grab them before work. Put your cleaning spray and paper towels on top of the bathroom counter so that you can quickly wipe it down.
Stock the bathroom with books – If you want to do less scrolling while in the bathroom, fill a basket of books so that you can read while… you know.
Make your hobbies easy to do – Leave your guitar out of its case, leave your paint supplies on the table, leave your running shoes and workout clothes laid out and easy to get to.
Put temptations out of sight – If you’re trying to cut down on sweets, but you’ve got a bowl full of candy on your kitchen counter, it’s going to be much harder to resist having a few pieces. Put things like that out of sight, in your cupboards or drawers. You might want to put your phone in a drawer if you’re prone to use it more than you’d like.
Establish a basket or bin for phones and tech to go into during meals, family time, etc. – The sight of your “phone bin” will remind you to put your phone away, and you can establish the habit in your partner or family members too.
I find that functional changes give you the greatest chance of success when it comes to meeting your goals and establishing good habits, because they make it easier to do so. It takes away some of the need for willpower.
Conclusion
Changing your environment is a powerful first step in creating and maintaining new habits.
Because your surroundings affect how you act and how you feel, it’s natural that if you want to act differently or feel differently, you should switch up your environment.
Making aesthetic changes to your environment can help you feel a sense of newness and in control of your surroundings, and plus they act as a reminder of the goals you are working on.
Making functional changes to your environment can modify how you interact with your surroundings to make your goals even easier to achieve.
“You don’t have to be a victim of your environment. You can be the architect of it.” – James Clear
So, what things would you like to do to change your environment — and change your life in the process?
Best of luck!
