Maybe you've run across the idea that it takes 21 days for a new behavior to become a habit. It's all over personal development scene.
Maybe you've tried it and found it didn't work for you (I have).
There's a reason: It actually takes, on average, 66 days.
That's according to a study published in the European Journal of Social Psychology.
Of course, that 66-day figure shouldn't be taken as gospel, either. Only 82 people completed the study, and the difficulty of the new habits people took on varied a lot.
The range of time it took an individual to establish a new habit was large--from 18 days to 254 days (!). So the main takeaway, I think, is that the commonly-cited figure of 21 days is too short for most people.
One encouraging find was that missing a day didn't affect the chances of success.
IMPROVING YOUR CHANCES OF SUCCESS
Here's how you can improve your chances of success in forming a new habit:
Own your decision. Make sure you're picking a new behavior that you value enough to stick with it, even if it turns out to take longer than you thought. This means a behavior you want to do, not just one other people think you should do.
Break a large task into smaller chunks and master one at a time. For instance, if you want to skip dessert in order to lose weight and you find that challenging, start by declaring Mondays (or another day) as dessert-free or make it the day you have a piece of fruit for dessert instead of something high-calorie. Once you're used to that, add another day or two.
Figure out where the time will come from. Not all new habits take time, but quite a few do. For instance, maybe you set out to exercise a half hour every day and you stick with it for a couple of weeks but then a week goes by and you realize you haven't exercised at all. Maybe the reason is that you didn't figure out what you're not going to do any more for 30 minutes in order to have time for exercise.
Keep track. Use a calendar to mark the days you do the new behavior. The longer you go on, the more likely it is that if you are tempted to stop, the tangible sign of how much time you've invested already will help you continue.
Use interim rewards. For instance, spending 15 minutes a day learning a new language will pay off in six months when you go on vacation to the country where that language is spoken, but six months can be a long time to delay gratification. Create some small rewards to award yourself at the end of each week that you've done the lessons daily.
Don't be too hard on yourself if you get side-tracked. It may take a couple of attempts but beating yourself up over it is a waste of energy. Instead, figure out why you stopped, adjust what you need to do, and get back to it.
