It only takes two minutes

The book Atomic Habits by James Clear is one of our bibles that we have read multiple times. It is one of our favorite books because it fully explains the process of how new habits are formed in the brain and how we can use this process to develop good habits or break bad ones that do not serve us.

We have fully utilized the book's advice to develop a habit of studying. One of the tips is about two-minute habits or starting with a very small habit that we need to repeat for a few months before we are ready for a longer period of time. So we also started with two minutes of studying per day. Yes, really! We studied for only two minutes a day for almost three months. But this was crucial in developing very strong studying habits that we are now happy to engage in.

The goal is to start with the habit first. Once we successfully start the habit for several months, it becomes easier. When we saw that we could easily do two minutes of studying, after three months we started to increase the duration of the habit. First to 10 minutes, then a little longer after a few weeks. Today, it is not difficult for us to sit down for two full hours of studying.

But that first step was crucial. We sat down at the table and started the stopwatch on our phone for those two minutes. The main condition was, and still is for us, to just sit at the table. We don't need to study, we just can't do anything else. And that small, so-called atomic habit according to the author, led us to successfully finish our universities.

So, if you have trouble getting started with studying, start with two minutes a day. And stick with it for several months. If you think others will mock you, you can easily avoid this by not telling them how much time you actually spend on this habit at the beginning. You don't need permission from others to start small, which will lead you to truly great goals.