This post is all about 8 toxic habits you need to quit this 2023.

Building new habits that have a positive impact on our lives is a new year’s resolution probably for most of us. But what about our toxic habits, the ones that bring us down little by little?

The truth is that breaking your bad habits is just as important as focusing on implementing new ones in your life.

Our habits are one of the most important foundations when it comes to our success because it is the little things that are done daily that have the biggest impact in the long term.

That is why today I want to share with you these 8 toxic habits you should quit this 2023 and the exact steps you need to take to break those habits successfully!

Let´s begin!

Toxic Habits n1º. Quit using your phone first thing in the morning

How many times have you used your phone first thing in the morning and started mindlessly scrolling through social media, the news… 

I personally am guilty of this habit from time to time. But why is this habit so harmful?

Well, do you know when our subconscious is the most vulnerable?

If your answer is in the morning you are completely right. During the first minutes of the morning, our subconscious is super vulnerable.

But why is this important? Because during those first minutes when our subconscious is most vulnerable when it is easier to manipulate and give our subconscious the information we want to feed it.

That is why our first actions in the morning are so crucial.

How to quit the toxic habit of using your phone in the morning?

Create a morning routine to keep you from reaching your phone. When you create a morning routine and a series of habits to complete right after you wake.

By doing this, we are waking up with a clear purpose and plan which we can strategically choose to feed our subconscious whatever message we want that is beneficial for our mind.

Having trouble with your self-discipline? Check out this article about these 4 keys to mastering self-discipline!

Quit the habit of hitting the snooze button every morning.

In the same way that taking your phone first thing in the morning is incredibly harmful to our mood and overall mental health, so is hitting the snooze button every morning.

I know how sexy and lovely that button looks, I still feel tempted many mornings to press the 10 more minutes button.

But what we are doing by continuously pressing the snooze button is telling our subconscious “Ok, I am not good at keeping commitments to myself. I am always behind and late. Life is chaos, and that’s the way it is. Let’s apply this to all other areas of life now!”

Because the way you do one thing is the way you do all things, starting from the way you make your bed, to the way you do your job.

Now the good news is that you have it in your power to nurture your subconscious mind with positive messages.

How to quit the habit of hitting the snooze button?

Before you think about it, no you don’t need to wake up at 6 in the morning nor does it have to be complicated.

Let´s say for example that you need to wake up at 8:00 to have enough time in the morning to do everything you need to do.

Would your life be over if you woke up at 7:55? No? Great! Because those extra 5 minutes are going to be the ones to set you apart from your old self!

Now what I want you to try is to wake up with a goal in mind, something to motivate you out of the bed in the mornings. For example, meditating for 5 minutes or making yourself a hot cup of coffee… This will distract you from the thought of hopping back into bed and pressing that snooze button.

 Toxic habits to quit. Negative self-talk

Your biggest enemy is yourself. And it will be this way until you start changing the way you talk to yourself.

We are afraid of not fitting in, of what people might think and say about us. But what we don’t realize is that we are the ones to judge and bully ourselves the most.

We talk to ourselves so unconsciously that it just slips from our minds, but how you see and talk to yourself matters the most.

And sadly most of the time what we are saying to ourselves is not good, or positive.

The funny thing about our minds (and consequently our mindsets) is that it will believe anything you tell it. This can be either your greatest advantage or your biggest downfall.

The good news is that it entirely depends on you which one of the two is. So who do you want to be? Your greatest supporter or the reason you fail?

Be careful of you are talking to yourself because you are listening.

How to break the habit of negative self-talk

In this case, self-awareness is your best friend and the first step to noticing our negative self-talk and how we treat ourselves.

Once you notice your inner dialogue, it´s time to rewire that mindset. And we are going to do this with 2 simple steps:

The first one is treating yourself with kindness and love.

The second one is working on eliminating your self-limiting beliefs. 

Self-awareness is important not only to notice our self-talk but also to recognize negative patterns and thoughts we repeat to ourselves because these are the ones that are going to hint at us our limiting beliefs about ourselves, the root problem.

To learn more about limiting beliefs check out this ultimate guide for beginners about beliefs!

To help you quit your negative self-talk I want to share with you this free downloadable that will not only help you discover yours but also teach you 3 insanely simple ways of neutralizing your limiting beliefs.

Every time you have a bad thought about yourself. Ask yourself “who is profiting from this emotion?”

Quit the habit of always complaining

This is a sneaky one because most of the time we don’t even realize we are doing it. But just because you don’t realize you are doing it, does not make it any less harmful.

You cannot expect to be happy and appreciate the good things in life while constantly complaining. Because the more you complain the more you feel drained, irritated, and anxious without your knowing.

How to break this toxic habit

• Take it as a challenge to not complain for the next 24 hours and pay special attention to the things you normally complain about.
• Whenever you catch yourself complaining, stop and don’t engage with those thoughts. Instead, choose something that makes you feel grateful and happy and recur to that thought to break the continuous cycle of complaining.
• Take a look and reflect on the people you spend the most time with, how they talk, do they complain, and what kind of mindset they have.
• Try journaling your thoughts at least once a week to find any toxic and repetitive patterns/thoughts that are poisoning your mind so that you can focus on eliminating them.

Quit the perfectionism habit

We hold ourselves to such high standards that we expect to be perfect at everything from the start.

We are too ashamed to look like a beginner so we become too hard on ourselves and we don’t allow ourselves the chance to learn and grow as a beginner.

Being perfectionistic and letting the fear of failure control our lives is so rooted in us that we don’t dare to try new things anymore.

Practice makes perfect. And the only way you are going to get to that point is if you first allow yourself to be bad at something new.

Tips to break the habit of perfectionism

• Have the heart of a child who loves to draw and paint even when he knows nothing about painting and drawing. They’re just so happy to draw. 
• Prioritize progress over perfection
• Allow yourself to make mistakes and not be perfect without judging yourself
• Be kind to yourself in your journey.
• Ditch the fear of failure. They are necessary on your journey to success. So change your mindset about them and see them as necessary lessons that will take you one step closer to achieving your goals rather than something to be ashamed of.

The toxic habit of procrastination

Quit your habit of waiting for the right and the right place.

Because the truth is, there is never a right time and a right place, there is time and what we do with it. 

Thinking there is a right time is a lie we tell ourselves to protect us from the possibility of failure or change. But one of the keys to success is to start before you are ready because there will never be a time when you will be fully ready to take on a challenge, a risk, or a new adventure.

So stop waiting for your life to happen, stop sitting on the benchmarks until you feel ready. Take on the risk and believe that no matter what comes your way and what struggles you face you will be strong enough to get past them.

Tips to help you quit the toxic habits of procrastination:

• Whenever you are tempted to procrastinate a task look at the bigger picture (i.g. how this habit impacts your life, the positive benefits, have in mind the bigger goal this task takes part in…) instead of focusing on the small things.
• Know that the most difficult part is showing up. One thing you need to know about procrastination is that the resistance is that strong up until we show up. Once we have started the task we dread so much you will find it gets easier. 

Here is an example of how you can use this to your advantage: Say you want to implement the habit of walking 30 minutes every day, but you keep procrastinating on this task. 

One thing that you could try is to commit to yourself that you will only walk for 10 minutes and call it a day. I mean how horrible can it be to walk for 10 minutes? What you will find once you start walking is that you don’t really mind walking for 5 or even 10 more minutes. And just like that little by little you will have achieved your goal of walking 30 minutes that day and avoid feeling guilty for procrastinating.

Another example of how to use this tip: Say you need to write an essay or a report, but you can’t bring yourself to start writing it. Set the goal to write 100 words, when you think about it 100 is not that much, the last two paragraphs you read are 114 words. But the funny thing is that once you start writing the words will start flowing and before you know it you will have written your essay because you overcame the hardest part that kept you from writing it: showing up.

• If there is a task that will take you less than five minutes, do it now. For example filling up your water bottle, picking up your clothes and putting them in your wardrobe, making your bed…

Toxic habits to quit N5º. Overspending 

We live in a world where every ad, every billboard, every image, and title on the internet is encouraging us to buy, buy and buy.

And unfortunately, most of us have never been taught anything about finances, how to manage our money and the most important thing: how to manage it to not become a slave to money.

So with this highly important information out of our hands, we are sent into the world. And what do most of us end up doing? Making bad and harmful decisions with our money. 

One of the worst of them we do? Spending money we don’t even have.

But this is the year we are putting an end to it. Because no matter how little you say you care about money the truth is that it controls our lives more than we led on. 

And the first step to do this is to stop overspending.

How to break this toxic habit

• Before you buy something asks yourself these two simple question?
  • The first is: Did I need this yesterday? If you didn’t there is a good chance you won’t need it today.
  • The second one is: do I already own something similar to what I am about to buy?
• Live below your means. By doing this you will not only break the habit of overspending, but you will also be able to redirect that money into your savings/investments deposit to put that money to good use.

Toxic Habits to quit. Multitasking

There is a common myth about productivity and multitasking. People truly believe that they will be more productive by multitasking.

But the truth is that only 2% of the population can productively multitask. So in reality what you are doing by engaging in this toxic habit is harming your productivity.

We are humans, not machines. And by trying to tackle multiple things at the same time instead of increasing our efficiency we are hampering our performance and focus.

How to break this toxic habit

Start slowly and bring awareness to your actions and the present moment.

Mindfulness and focusing on the present moment is a great practice that will help you break the habit of multitasking. So focus on one task at a time and give it your full heart.

“When walking walk, when eating eat”

Thich Nhat Hahn

Final thought thoughts on toxic habits to quit this 2023

Remember that things are not going to magically change just because you want them to. So take action, choose the toxic habits you want to break, and start focusing on them one by one.

Now having said this, don´t start changing these habits with the mindset that your actual self is bad or not good enough.

You are enough and everything you need to be happy is already within you. Don´t change yourself with the mindset that you are not good enough, change yourself because you believe in your full potential and because you want to bring out your best version, which is already inside of you.

Thank you for investing your time in this article about these 8 toxic habits to quit this 2023!

Remember to believe in yourself and that you are worthy of even your wildest dreams!

Which habits do you engage in and which ones are you going to give up first? I would love to read you in the comments!

Hope you have a great day!