Coaching practices for The One Thing During a Big Change
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For The One Thing During a Big Change, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- I’ve got a big move (or a new job) coming up in a couple of months, and I can feel it’s a rare chance to start fresh
- A big change is coming and I’m so focused on what’s next that I’m treating the last weeks of this chapter as a waiting room
- I’m right in the middle of a big upheaval
- My morning run, my reading habit
- Nothing about my life is changing on the outside, but I’m dragging the weight of every past failed attempt
Practices that may help
- Identify and anticipate upcoming transition windows
Treat approaching life changes as scheduled opportunities for habit installation — plan before the transition, not after.
The Habit Discontinuity Effect - The last chance before a transition
Before a major life change, fully inhabit what is ending, rather than only anticipating what comes next.
The Last Time Meditation - Use a life transition to break old environment-behavior links
Major context changes (a move, a new job) create a rare window where old habits are disrupted and new ones are easier to form.
Environment Design for Behavior Change - Actively protect valuable existing habits during transitions
Deliberately transfer the cues for good habits to the new context before the disruption extinguishes them.
The Habit Discontinuity Effect - Use temporal landmarks to create psychological fresh starts
New week, new month, new year, or any personally meaningful date can function as a psychological reset that boosts motivation to change.
The Habit Discontinuity Effect - Update your love map after major life changes
When life shifts, assume your map is outdated and ask new questions.
Love Maps: Knowing Your Partner's Inner World - Let adversity reorder your priorities
Use the clarity that hardship brings to permanently re-rank what actually matters to you.
Benefit-Finding: Locating Meaning and Growth in Adversity - Time nudges to coincide with natural transition points
People are most open to changing habits at life transitions — capitalize on fresh-start moments.
Nudge Theory, Made Practical - Use social transitions to change the norms around your behavior
When your social group changes, use the transition to adopt the behavioral norms of the new group rather than carrying old ones.
The Habit Discontinuity Effect - The Habit Discontinuity Effect
The habit discontinuity effect, studied by Phillippa Lally and Bas Verplanken among others, shows that environmental disruptions — moving house, changing jobs, starting university — weaken the contextual cues that sustain existing habits, creating a window of increased behavior malleability. Evidence comes primarily from observational and survey studies; the effect appears real but its magnitude varies considerably by habit type and individual.
Related concerns
- Nature And Movement During A Big Change
Treat approaching life changes as scheduled opportunities for habit installation — plan before the transition, not after.
Identify and anticipate upcoming transition windows
- Atomic Habits During A Big Change
James Clear’s system says behavior change is a system problem, not a willpower problem: make a desired habit obvious, attractive, easy, and satisfying — and do the reverse for bad ones. The most load-bearing ideas (implementation intentions, friction reduction, identity-based change) are well supported in the research literature.
- Inhabit Life Transitions
When your social group changes, use the transition to adopt the behavioral norms of the new group rather than carrying old ones.
Use social transitions to change the norms around your behavior
- Life Transition Habit Change
The habit discontinuity effect, studied by Phillippa Lally and Bas Verplanken among others, shows that environmental disruptions — moving house, changing jobs, starting university — weaken the contextual cues that sustain existing habits, creating a window of increased behavior malleability. Evidence comes primarily from observational and survey studies; the effect appears real but its magnitude varies considerably by habit type and individual.
- The Good Life Lessons From The Harvard Study During A Big Change
The Harvard Study of Adult Development — the longest longitudinal study of adult life, directed today by Robert Waldinger — found that the strongest predictor of long-term health and happiness is the quality of our relationships, not wealth or fame. It is real, decades-long research, but it is observational: it shows relationships and wellbeing move together, which is strong but not proof of pure cause.
- When Habit Discontinuity Effect Transition Window Identification
Treat approaching life changes as scheduled opportunities for habit installation — plan before the transition, not after.
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