How to build habits when your life has no schedule, routine or consistency. Anchor Moments.

If your calendar changes every week, your habits can still stay rock solid and it starts with one surprisingly simple move: stop attaching consistency to a schedule and start attaching it to a consistent daily trigger that happens no matter what. We talk through why more than 80% of daily decisions happen on autopilot, and how that autopilot can either build your health or quietly drain it when life feels scattered. We answer a common question from people who retire, travel often, work hybr...

• 0:09Speaker 00

  Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of Change Wired Podcast. My name is Angela Sharina, I'm your host, I'm your partner in personal and collective transformation, your certified master health, sleep, nutrition, executive, self-actualization coach, I'm just someone who is really passionate about doing our best, feeling our best, looking at our best every day and learning how to unlock and using this life more and more of our potential, so together we can live the most extraordinary lives, creating the most positive impact in this world. Today, guys, we are talking about something that I'm super passionate about these days,

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  routines, habits, all the things that make us, you know, there is this saying, you build your routines, you build your habits, and then your habits build you, and that is so true, because more than 80% or somewhere in that window of our thoughts, decisions, actions run on autopilot, you're not making most of your decisions for most of your actions in your day, guys, your brain is triggered by something in your environment, by people, things, places, and then routine is implemented, without you really being always aware or

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  making any decisions about why you do things the way you do things. And there is a window, there are moments, many actually, if you decide to create them, when you can interrupt this process and can set yourself up for implementing different routines and habits and rituals. So then, on autopilot, you implement the routines and habits that you want to do more of in your life, so those create the kind of person, without you thinking about it, the kind of person that you want, the kind of person who creates the impact in the world and your life that you want.

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  I got a question from a former client of mine, I'm gonna read to you from a blog, your question, "You write and talk a lot about habits, a minimum viable habit is the latest episode that client listened to, and routines to eliminate the need for willpower and discipline, but what about people like myself right now," she retired not so long ago, "who don't have a regular routine anymore, when you aren't employed, or you travel a lot, like what do you do then? How do you build habits when you have no routine, when you have no schedule, when you have no consistency seemingly?"

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  Another question that I get quite often, "How do you maintain consistent exercise habits when your routine doesn't allow you to take classes or go to the gym consistently? What do you do then?"

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  And guys, these days, believe it or not, but more and more people are faced with this question, like, "How do you build habits when I have no routine and everything feels like it's all over the place?" Whether that's flexible working hours, basically often means you work about any hour of the day, or hybrid work setting, or you and your parent, and obviously the kid does whatever and whatever the kid wants to do, or you are an entrepreneur and you work in your own business, or like, maybe you live as a digital nomad and you travel quite a bit, and you

• 3:58Speaker 00

  maybe even a week, couple of weeks, you change where you are, what you do, what you're surrounded with, when you wake up, when you work, etc. And I have quite some experience with that, 15 years, I spent 15 years traveling around the world, living in different places, as a digital nomad, in different cultures, doing work, which I still do, across many time zones, and having meetings and calls in the most odd hours of the day, from 4:30 to sometimes 8 and 9pm. I do try to keep it consistent and sleep-friendly, so I get to maintain my health and wellbeing.

• 4:41Speaker 00

  But I spent quite a chunk of my life, before I settled down in Cape Town three years ago, changing everything around me, and my routines and schedules and time zones, quite a bit. And over all of that, I maintained really solid exercise, fitness routine. I exercised every day unless I was in hospital, I had one serious accident. Regardless, I would stick with my fitness, and sometimes I wouldn't have a gym, and sometimes the weather wasn't good, and sometimes I didn't speak the language, and I was in a place where I couldn't really even do a walk, there were so many changes, say, in

• 5:26Speaker 00

  my routine and places and schedule, and I'm also an entrepreneur, and for my entire life, I worked for myself, and I did not have any schedule that I had to show up for. My schedule often is dictated by my clients, and also meetings I need to take to move my business forward, right? No job, no studies, no family schedule dictating my day, in some moments, it felt like it was all over the place. And I learned that exactly in those most flexible, unpredictable moments and periods of my life, that's exactly when I needed to create some structure the most.

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  Otherwise, I would feel like a leaf thrown from place to place by the winds of life, very chaotic, very uncertain, very stressful, right? Routines, guys, they give your brain boundaries, rules, guardrails to follow, so your brain stops wandering off to entertain itself with behaviors you don't want. Your brain will get you busy with something, anything. If you're not an advanced meditator, you know how your brain always wants to do something, "Oh, I should do this, and this, and that," and without proper structure in place, that's something that your brain finds to do, won't always at all, especially in our pro-bisonogenic,

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  pro-consumption environment, your brain will find something that you might not be happy with at all. So how do you build a good routine when your location or schedule change all the time?

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  And what I found, and how I maintained my health and fitness routines through all this movement and craziness, you anchor your habits to the keystone moments of your day, the things that happen no matter what, and you make those moments, what I call anchor moments, into triggers that prompt you to do the behavior you want to do more of, like exercise.

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  If everything else in your environment changes all the time, find those things that don't.

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  We all wake up in the morning, you wake up at some point, you probably brush your teeth, you take a shower, you have breakfast, or at least coffee. What if you used one of those moments, or if you, as a signal for your brain to jump-start the routine you want? Like exercise, wake up, drink 500ml of water, a couple of glasses, brush your teeth, and then schedule some exercise, go for a walk, or do a body weight workout from an app, YouTube, or your favorite Instagram influencer, make it, and that is important, guys, make it location and equipment independent, so you can do it anywhere, whether you have classes

• 8:32Speaker 00

  or no classes, gym, no gym, rain, shine, no hurricane outside. Have a version for the outside, for the inside, for the gym, for the without gym, use the version of the routine that fits the conditions around you, and so when you are in those conditions, it's like pushing a button and activating an app. "Hey, it's raining outside," or "very stormy," and "I don't have access to any gym, so therefore, I'm gonna be doing this workout that I defined in advance."

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  If you are more of an afternoon or an evening person, or exerciser, scheduling it right before lunch or dinner, you'll have those at some point in your day, whatever, whenever you are. I prefer mornings, and I recommend to a lot of my clients to use the mornings, is for that key habit, like exercise, that you want to do every single day, no matter what, because that part of the day, your morning, is usually more within your control. And the same happened to me, I realized, "Ah, morning is more in my control than anything else." And yes, my brain is also the sharpest, and I need to do work in the morning, but I learned

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  and I tried different things, that if I don't do my exercise in the morning, then there is always this like, "Oh, I need to do this, and this, and there is afternoon, and then I gotta do something else," and a lot of times, something will get in the way, I'm like, "No way." Even if it's a minimum workout, even it's like freaking 15 minutes, I'm gonna do it first thing in the morning, if I want to do more later, okay, but I'll do something in the morning." And that's how I maintain consistency. I've been to the gym for 26 years, guys, 26 years, and I'm from Russia, Siberia, and I'm living in South Africa, I know a thing or two about change and how to keep your routine when you have no routine.

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  Right, when I went through heavy travel stretches, a remote jungle in Mexico, high in the Swiss Alps, farms in Italy, I'd do my yoga or body weight high intensity interval training workout with less meals app or some YouTube video I would download in advance, because often I would also not know if I would have internet or not. Then I'd move on to a walk where I could, even if it was around the farm or the garden, then breakfast and whatever the day had planned for me. I found that, guys, when you think ahead about your need to exercise, the same way you think ahead about your breakfast, there's always a way to make it happen. Like,

• 11:13Speaker 00

  you'll find your breakfast somewhere, huh? How did you manage that throughout all of these years without routine? So you can find the space and time and a way to do your exercise as well. Most people's struggles, I've coached people for 18 years now, guys, most people's struggles with routine comes down to one line, myself including. Your best intentions die of lack of preparation. Whether I want to work in my business, where I want to work on my studies, where I want to work in my relationships, things happen when I plan and prepare. Things do not happen or happen rarely if I do not plan and prepare. Think what you want, plan for what you

• 11:54Speaker 00

  want, prepare a little in advance, and you'll be surprised how well that solves 99% of your challenges with structure, rituals, daily rhythm, which by the way is so calming amidst all the change. Like, seriously, stress management experts and researchers recommend routines and habits as stress management mechanism. Your brain loves stability. It's calming. Imagine if you are a caveman running in savanna of Africa, when things are predictable, whether that's your

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  breakfast coming at the same time, movement, sun, sunset, rain and shine, when things are predictable, the brain finds it very satisfying and calming and almost de-stressing when things are all over the place and you have no plan or structure, that is very uncomfortable for the brain, because your brain never knows what to prepare you for, how to manage resources like energy. So when you have routine and structure amidst change as much as possible, that's actually gonna make you feel a lot calmer and help you to deal with the situations as they come up a lot better. So when everything around you keeps changing, find the moments in your day, which I

• 13:18Speaker 00

  call anchor moments, that don't. When everything around you keeps changing, find the moments in your day that don't. Like waking up, brushing your teeth, having a coffee, lunch, dinner, whatever works for that habit that you're trying to do. And tie your most important habits to those moments, anchor moments. At some point, you decided that brushing your teeth and taking a shower and having breakfast were in negotiable. So you found a way through all the changes. So what would it take to make your exercise routine another non-negotiable two? Again, what would it take

• 14:00Speaker 00

  to make your exercise routine, or some other routine or habit you're working on, another non-negotiable two that happens no matter what? Like, imagine if you're a new parent and your kid needs care, you'll find a way. You find a way to have breakfast. You find a way to do the important things. And if you're going through a period of change and transitions and it feels like your responsibilities, your schedule, everything is all over the place, find the moments that don't move and bring along more habits that you need to make happen consistently to feel,

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  look and do your absolute best. Anchor moments, that is the theme of today's podcast. When everything around you keeps changing, find the moments in your day that don't. And

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  connect as many routines and habits and actions to those anchor moments and you'll be surprised, again, how easy it's gonna get to implement those new routines and habits. And once they become your new autopilot thing, you're gonna implement them without thinking. And it's like pressing a button on your phone. You press it and the thing opens up and does its thing. Some people go even as crazy as like sleeping in their workout clothing and putting their shoes right before bed. I found for myself it's unnecessary if I just have a plan and decide to stick to it, like to brushing my teeth. It's like, you know, I wake up, I don't think about,

• 15:40Speaker 00

  should I brush my teeth or not? I just do them because I get out in the world and see people. I don't want my breasts to stink. But also the same with fitness. I want to look my freaking best till the rest of my life, you know, even with all the aging, etc. But I want to look the best I can be. I can look in those given conditions, given my age and other circumstances. And the way to get there, just like with brushing your teeth, is to install a habit that you do regularly. And you do that easier by connecting that thing that you need to do every day to the moments that never change in your day, like never. Again, Siberia, South Africa,

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  US, Turkey or Egypt or Thailand. Like, I wake up, I brush my teeth, I have my breakfast. And so I can as well just do my fitness. And the additional component, component to that, as I mentioned to you, have a routine for gym, no gym equipment, no equipment, feeling your best, not feeling your best, rain, shine, hurricane, monsoon season. And again, you'll be surprised how well this works when you decide to make it happen, when you make the decision that, hey, for me to live my most extraordinary life, fitness is a non-negotiable, just like brushing my teeth,

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  having coffee or breakfast. And plan, prep, and you'll be surprised how 99% of the time you'll be able to do it just fine. Thank you, guys, for tuning in. I thank you for listening. And before you jump off, guys, an announcement. We have a support button on the main page of my podcast. Support with three, with five, with eight, with $10, that would mean a world to me, would motivate me to do even better work every single day. You know, people are driven by rewards. So the link to the page, the main page with the support and everything of my podcast, of ChangeWire,

• 17:49Speaker 00

  that you're listening to right now, is in the show notes. Click it. It's, and then support me if you can. If you love this podcast, I'd love your support. Again, I'm a human. I'm motivated by rewards as well. And also there in the show notes, there is a one-off session for nutrition, lifestyle, habit coaching, one-off session where I'm gonna talk about your struggles, gonna give you the best possible tools, and then for the next two weeks, gonna support you to implement all of these tools to feel, look and do your absolute best. So the support page and one-off session links are in the show notes. And don't forget, guys, don't forget to share,

• 18:34Speaker 00

  review this podcast so we reach more people all around the world. We are a global podcast, 11,000 plus cities. And that's it for today. Till next time. Find those anchor moments. Connect all the habits you want to do for the rest of your life or for a really, really long time. Find those anchor moments. Connect your most needed habits. And till next time, keep growing.