If you are unsure where to start, choose a task from your to-do list and take action. You don’t know how? You’re unsure where to begin? Confusion is just a form of procrastination, and procrastination is just a habit. “I don’t know how” is an excuse used by our lower brain to keep us from expending energy. You will only “know how” as you move forward. What if you did know how? What would be your first step?

Many of us are stuck in unhelpful habitual behaviors we have learned to use for self-comfort. Along with confusion and procrastination, these self-soothing habits can hold you back, arresting any forward progress toward your dreams:

• Overeating, snacking
• Drinking more than you want to
• Social Media
• TV/Screen Entertainment
• Staying up too late
• Binge shopping

Sometimes we rush to soothe uncomfortable feelings with food, alcohol, scrolling social media, wasteful shopping or other fast-fixes. With enough repetition of this cycle, our brain is rewired to expect the same easy dopamine hit every time we are stressed, bored, lonely, sad or otherwise unhappy.

Our brain begins to form a strong connection between the uncomfortable feeling and our response, the fast-fix. This creates a very sticky habit, causing us to choose the behavior again and again until it is even more entrenched.

In an attempt to extricate ourselves from these behaviors, we make promises to ourselves that we do not keep. The realization that we cannot trust ourselves leads to deep anxiety and feelings of low self worth. You might feel helpless, stuck or even believe you’re all alone. But you certainly are not alone.

I have been there myself, mired in a swamp of confusion and inaction. I would start a new day with the best intentions, then head to bed that night with nothing much to show for the day other than a list of promises to myself unfulfilled. I learned some valuable tools like setting boundaries for my own behavior and  strategies for creating habit change that helped me start taking action, and so can you.

Most of us have some type of unwanted habitual behaviors that steal our energy and joy, waste our time and money, and if never addressed, sometimes even cause us to quit our dreams. Even those of us with lots of grit fall into these patterns.

But willpower is finite. You only have a certain amount in you at one time. Using it to overcome urges all day— to avoid unwanted behaviors like overeating, overdrinking or impulse shopping— will soon deplete it, and the cycle begins again, on an endless loop.