Day 4 - Aversion Training in Action - Freedom From Bad Habits

Welcome to Day 4 of the 5-day Freedom From Bad Habits e-Course!

By now you should be tracking your habits daily using the Habit Tracker, broken down your habit into multiple steps, and completed through the Trigger, Action, and Rewards Worksheet.

Now that we've finished talking about awareness and avoidance, I want to talk to you about the third A.

One way to frame it is "association" but I prefer the tactical word aversion. In order to break your habit, you must make yourself no longer like doing the habit.

The best way to do this is through aversive conditioning. Aversive conditioning is the process where you feel a negative stimulus at the same time you do a bad habit.

Whether biting your nails, smoking a cigarette, or eating sugar... If you feel a slightly negative sensation at the same time, your brain will associate those two stimuli together until you stop liking the habit.

Assuming you’ve done your homework from the last three days… It’s time to start the first day of your aversion therapy! Aversion training is the backbone of the Pavlok method, classical Pavlovian conditioning.

For this exercise, all you need is a rubber band. If you've taken advantage of our $169 + free shipping offer (using code THANKSSHIPPING), you can do this with your Pavlok.

Step 1: Using a rubber band (or Pavlok), you'll imagine yourself doing the bad habit and snap the band at the same time.

Please listen to the short audio file. Make sure you have a rubber band (and a comfortable chair) before you begin.

Listen & Download Audio Here

Step 2: Using your Triggers, Actions, and Rewards Worksheet, refer to it to choose an alternative behavior at least once today. If you lost the link, it's located here.

Pay attention to your cravings, and use something other than your bad habit to address a trigger.

Step 3: Try to put off your bad habit for at least ten minutes.

For example, if you start craving a cigarette, and you think it's because you're feeling down or tired, you can try going for a brisk walk instead.

If you still want the cigarette after 10 minutes of walking, you can go ahead and have it (but we encourage you to resist, if you can!).