This is How to Be a Better Human.

I'm your host, Chris Duffy.

And today, I wrote three pages in a journal.

I exercised for seven minutes, and I just finished my second glass of water.

Now, I mentioned those things because they're all habits that I'm trying to build.

They're small ones, but I think they are remarkably difficult for me to actually do every day.

And if I'm being honest, the only reason I did those habits today was because I knew that I was going to record this podcast and I wanted to be able to talk about them. You know, I think a lot of habits are like that, right? Things that we try to force ourselves to do because they're the habits of the person that we want to be. And our hope is, if we do the habits enough, it'll stop feeling like something we have to force and we'll just be closer to that ideal self. Well, our guest today on the show is Eric Zimmer. He's the host of The One You Feed podcast, and he's the author of the new book, How a Little Becomes a Lot, The Art of Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life.

I'm so excited to talk to Eric for a number of reasons, but two of the biggest are that Eric has been thinking for years about how the small actions we do every day add up to be the big,

meaningful results of how we live our life. And I love that Eric is very honest about how hard it can be to change those

small actions. Here is a clip from his 2016 talk at TEDx Columbus. Making lasting changes in our

behavior is a battle. It's difficult, and most of us don't succeed at it for very long. And I host a

podcast where I've talked to over 150 thought leaders and

authors and psychologists and spiritual teachers, people like Andrew Solomon, Carol Dweck, Simon,

Simon Sinek, Don Miguel Ruiz. And we talk about what it means to live a good life. And right at the heart of living a good life is being able to choose how we want to behave and actually follow through on that.

Most of us think when it comes to creating new habits, that it's a matter of willpower or discipline, and that we don't have enough of either.

We might suspect inwardly that maybe we're just the kind of person who can't follow through

on things. We think that making lasting change is something that only other people can do.

One of the key ideas I'd like you to get today is that changing behavior is a skill.

It's something that you can learn to do.

You can get better at creating new habits.

We're going to talk about how to create those habits and keep them with Eric right after this break.

Today we're talking with Eric Zimmer about how small changes can make our lives much more meaningful.

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