Habit Tracker

Synopsis

Need to create new habits? It takes between two to eight months for a habit to stick. We've created this Habit Tracker spreadsheet template in Microsoft Excel to track daily, weekly, and monthly habits across multiple habit categories that can be color coded. Gamify your habits with custom reward amounts for each habit completed, and track progress from month to month or year to date for any year between 2023 and 2033. Supports 400 daily, weekly, and monthly habits across multiple habit types. Like a bullet journal in spreadsheet form, achieve work-life balance with this work-life planner!

Questions and answers

For planning

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To plan your habits, you first need to define your goal. Then, choose habits that help you reach your goal. For example, if your goal is to improve your health, choose habits like exercising or eating healthy.

Next, for each habit, specify a reward. This reward can be something simple like enjoying a movie or buying a specific item. Rewards motivate you to stick to your habits.

Then, using a habit planner, track your progress. This helps you see how close you are to your goal and what changes you need to make.

Finally, it's important to be patient. Creating new habits may take time, but with consistent follow-up, you can reach your goal.

Is this from the book atomic habits?

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The resource you're referring to is a "Habit Tracker" spreadsheet, not a book. It's designed to help users develop and track their habits. While it shares some concepts with the book "Atomic Habits" by James Clear, such as the importance of habit formation for personal and professional growth, it's not directly taken from the book. The tracker offers features like gamification and progress tracking, which can be useful tools in habit formation, as suggested in "Atomic Habits". However, it's a standalone tool and not a part of the book.

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How to create new habits

How long does it take to form a new habit? According to James Clear, the author of the book Atomic Habits, it can take between two to eight months to make a habit "automatic." If you've ever wondered "how to achieve my goals", or "how to create new habits", this Habit Tracker spreadsheet is for you. But James Clear says the key is to focus on habits, not goals, as the achievement of a goal is only a momentary change, not a sustained change.

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What are some other ways to track progress of habits?

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Apart from using a habit tracker app or online habit tracker, you can also use a spreadsheet template to track your habits. Other methods include using a journal to document your progress, setting reminders on your phone, or using a wall calendar where you can mark off each day you successfully follow through with your habit.

What are some other ways to gamify habits?

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There are several ways to gamify habits. One way is to set up a reward system for each time you successfully complete a habit. This could be something simple like treating yourself to a favorite snack or activity. Another way is to create a competition with friends or family members who are also trying to develop the same habit. You could also use a habit tracking app that provides visual progress and rewards. Lastly, you could set up a challenge for yourself, such as trying to maintain the habit for a certain number of days without breaking the streak.

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Human brains are hardwired to take the path of least resistance, which makes the adoption of new habits hard. Instead, James recommends a four-step process: Make them obvious, make them attractive, make them easy, and make them satisfactory. You don't need a habit tracker app or online habit tracker to do this. Our Habit Tracker spreadsheet template does all four of James' suggestions. Check it out:

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What are some challenges that might be encountered when using the habit tracker and how can they be overcome?

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Some challenges that might be encountered when using the habit tracker include difficulty in maintaining consistency, forgetting to update the tracker, or feeling overwhelmed by the number of habits to track. These challenges can be overcome by setting realistic goals, setting reminders to update the tracker, and focusing on a few key habits at a time.

How can the habit tracker contribute to personal development?

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A habit tracker can contribute to personal development by providing a visual representation of your habits, making them more obvious. This can help you identify patterns, understand your behavior better, and make necessary changes. It can also motivate you to maintain good habits and break bad ones, as you can see your progress over time. Furthermore, by tracking different categories of habits such as creative, career, financial, or fitness, you can ensure a balanced personal development.

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First, the Habit Tracker spreadsheet makes your habits obvious. Under the Fields tab, enter the habit categories of different habits you want to track, such as creative, career, financial, or fitness, next to the color you want those habits to be on your tracker. In this "color selector" section, you also have the option to customize the color you each week of the month to be, with week 5 representing any extra days depending on the month.

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Below the "color selector", define which new habits to learn across each of the categories in the "habit selector." These could be daily… weekly… or monthly habits… Up to 10 daily, weekly, and monthly habits can be tracked across each of the 15 habit types for a total of 450 habits that can be tracked at one time - not that James Clear would recommend that!

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Once all the habits to implement have been added, at the bottom, assign a reward amount for each of the habits to be tracked in the "Reward selector" section. For each day that a daily habit is checked off, that dollar amount is rewarded.

How to track habits

Time to make the habits to track easy and satisfactory. On the "Monthly habits" tab, enter any start month in the filter at the top. The habit tracker is now set from the first of that month. Your progress complete to date, and total earned to date for the whole month are listed underneath.

Each of the habits defined before appears according to their color type in the daily habit list. For each day a habit is completed, check off that day on the daily habit tracker. Boom - easy! As each daily habit is completed, the daily completed percentage goes up.

As daily habits are completed across an entire week, the weekly progress bar fills up. Underneath that, the reward earned for each day is tallied. The total earned to date box then tallies the total amount of daily reward earned for the whole month. But there are weekly and monthly tasks to accomplish as well. Each weekly task, like visiting family, washing the car, or hosting a game night is listed out.

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Each week a task is completed, that week can be checked off. The progress bar tracks the percentage completed, with the total amount earned to date. Finally, the monthly habits are listed, with a checkbox to check completition.

The daily, weekly, and monthly earnings are all summed at the top to see how much progress has been made across all habits to date. Remember, if you want to create new habits, you can download and customize this habit tracker.

Track your progress for a whole year

Let's say you want to track habits in February - when you change the date filter, clear the checkboxes and start over. To keep your progress, either duplicate this tab or use the Full year habits tab. This tab works the same as the Monthly habits tab but includes all 12 months of the current year all in one spot to track progress to date over time.

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In this view, the habit rows are hidden by default. When the next year hits, duplicate this tab, select 2024, and clear the progress to start over. As months of progress go by, the progress boxes at the top sums up all your progress.

James Clear says that 1% improvement every day is all it needs to be successful, thanks to compounding interest. With this habit tracker, you'll have everything you need to track your progress to continuous improvement.

Remember, you can download and customize this habit tracker spreadsheet template in Microsoft Excel or Google sheets right now. Now, go check out our To Do List spreadsheet template for more tips and tools to maximize your personal productivity.