Hi, my name is Melissa Urban, and you're listening to Do the Thing, a

podcast where we explore what's been missing every time you've tried to make a

change and make it stick.

Today my guest is James Clear, Habit researcher, and author of Atomic Habits, one of my new favorite books about habit and change.

James doesn't know this, but I basically consider us BFFs inside my head.

We've read so much of the same habit research. We share many of the same

keystone habits in our own lives, and he's got a simple direct tough love approach

that kind of reminds me of my own. There's a ton of habit research built into

the whole 30 rules, resources, and support. Everything from choosing the number 30 to our

tagline, I am Whole 30, is grounded in Habit Science, although I didn't actually

plan it that way.

Much of the whole 30 was created before I started studying habit,

willpower, and change.

The original rules, the original support that I wrote,

all of that came from my own experience in recovery from my drug addiction

I learned so many lessons about a growth mindset habit priming and keystone habits during my first few years in recovery

although I had no idea what those things were called. I figured if it worked for me

there they would probably work for my whole 30 years giving up the foods they loved for 30 days in the name of self-experimentation.

It wasn't until a few years later that I started really digging into the psychology of change and habit,

and realizing there are reasons why what I did back then

worked so well.

I've been able to apply much of what I learned

...