Before The Wake-Up Call: The Habits Guiding Your Next Decade

“The habits we don’t see are the ones that lead us.”

— Thich Nhat Hanh

“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do.”

-Brene Brown

If you want a glimpse of your next ten years, take a careful look at the last ten.

The patterns you carry forward, how you think, spend, move, and eat, are already shaping what is to come. Most of us do not realize how deeply our habits steer our lives until something forces us to look: a diagnosis, a financial reckoning, or a loss.

But what if we did not wait for a wake-up call? What if we chose to see now?

The Gravity of Habit

Researchers estimate that roughly 40 to 43 percent of what we do each day is habitual, actions we repeat without conscious awareness. One meta-analysis on habit formation shows it can take anywhere from 59 to 154 days to form a new habit, depending on consistency, cues, and the complexity of the behavior (see Scientific American)

What we do repeatedly, we become. Without conscious intervention, the next decade often looks very much like the last.

Why Change So Often Waits for Crisis

Many of us wait until something urgent forces change: an illness, a threat to financial security, a fractured relationship.

I have felt this personally. For me, money management stayed in the “maybe someday” box for years. But as retirement nears, the time for postponement has passed.

For many people, the push to change only comes after fear or crisis.

Mindfulness offers another path: noticing before the breaking point.

A Personal Habit Inventory

This practice is not about shame. It is about clarity. It is about seeing what has been steering your life so you can decide what stays and what shifts.

Take a quiet moment and a journal. Write down one or two habits you have carried into each new year in these areas:

1. Body / Health – how you eat, rest, and move
2. Mind / Emotion – worry loops, patterns of self-critique or comfort
3. Finances / Resources – spending, saving, or avoiding
4. Connection / Relationships – how you engage or pull away
5. Spirit / Attention – where your focus goes and how you nourish stillness

Then ask yourself:

– When and where does this habit show up?

– What does it try to give me?

– What has it cost me over time?

– What might open if I loosen its hold?

You do not have to change everything at once. Choose one habit to bring gently into awareness first. The shift begins when you see clearly.

Mindfulness: The Gateway to Change

Mindfulness does not force transformation. It invites the space for transformation.

When you practice present-moment awareness, your breath, sensations, impulses, you begin to notice the moments when habit is acting you, rather than you acting it. That is the threshold of choice.

Braving the Habit Shift

“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do.”

— Brené Brown

To shift habits, we must first lean in with compassion. Change is not about beating yourself into a new shape. It is about turning toward the patterns you have carried and having the courage to welcome what arises.

Breaks, missteps, and relapses do not mean failure. They are part of the terrain when we move from autopilot into awareness.

Before the Storm

Catastrophe may wake us, but wisdom invites us to wake first.

Turn toward the patterns that have walked beside you for years. Ask which you would like by your side ten years from now. Then begin, not with force, but with awareness, curiosity, and kindness.

Change does not happen all at once. It begins the moment you see clearly what has always been steering you.

Here’s to the present moment,

Jan

Further Reading & Resources

Scientific American –

How Long Does It Really Take to Form a Habit? https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-long-does-it-really-take-to-form-a-habit/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

PMC — Making Health Habitual: The Psychology of Habit Formation https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3505409/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

PMC — Time to Form a Habit: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11641623/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

The School of Life — Wu Wei: The Art of Effortless Action (optional supporting article if you decide to restore the Daoist angle) https://www.theschooloflife.com/article/wu-wei-doing-nothing/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

Books Mentioned

Braving the Wilderness by Brené Brown

Daring Greatly by Brené Brown

Atomic Habits by James Clear