She Can Heal Podcast

Ep. 71 - How to Stop Making Excuses and Start New Habits

• Keila Aldea, LCSW • Season 3 • Episode 71

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Ready to trade willpower for systems that actually work? We’re kicking off a fresh season and a new year by unpacking how to reset your habits with less friction and more joy. If excuses, procrastination, and “I’ll start tomorrow” have been running the show, this conversation gives you a roadmap to take back your time, energy, and identity—without shame or hustle.

We break down the four laws from Atomic Habits—make it obvious, attractive, easy, and satisfying—and apply them to everyday goals like drinking more water, lifting consistently, scrolling less, and keeping a calmer home. You’ll hear practical strategies you can use today: clear cues that your brain can’t ignore, temptation bundling that makes habits feel fun, the two-minute rule to spark momentum, and simple rewards that reinforce progress. I also share how identity shapes behavior and how to use the “never miss twice” rule to bounce back fast after slip-ups.

You’ll walk away with real-life examples from my own life and how I have implemented these principles to improve my habits.  These small design choices turn “I should” into “I do,” and help you build emotional, physical, and spiritual habits that feel natural instead of forced.

If you’re craving consistency and a gentler path to growth, this is your reset. Share this with someone who needs a fresh start, then subscribe for more science-backed tools and honest support. If the episode helps, leave a quick rating and review so we can reach more women who want to heal, thrive, and protect their energy this year.

90-day Self-Growth Journal - A great companion you can use on your healing journey. For 90 days you will have daily prompts on the topics of self-love, self-care and gratitude.  This journal is great for beginners, novice and anyone that wants to dive deeper into their true selves.   https://amzn.to/4fk14sq


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SPEAKER_00:

Hello and welcome to the She Can Heal Podcast, a podcast aimed at helping women heal and thrive emotionally, physically, and spiritually. I am your host, Kayla El Dia. I'm a licensed therapist and a self-care advocate that is passionate about helping women take back their power and help them realize they're important, worthy, and deserve the care and attention they give to those they love most in their lives. This show is meant to help inspire you on your healing journey, no matter if you're in the discovery phase and are just realizing that you have unhealed wounds, habits, and mindsets that are keeping you stuck in your life, or you've been on this journey for a while and are looking for inspiration, encouragement, andor new tools to help you continue on your healing journey. My goal is to help you realize that you can heal from all that life has thrown at you and are capable of evolving into your healthiest and happiest version. On this show, I will provide you with resources, tools, and insights to help you heal and thrive emotionally, physically, and spiritually because you deserve all of that. So if you're ready to ditch the guilt and make yourself a priority, then you're in the right place. Because the truth is that you can't pour from an empty cup, even though most of us do this on a regular, and we really need to stop that nonsense. So get ready to be inspired, motivated, and equipped to truly thrive. Hello my friend, and welcome to season three of the Che Can Heal Podcast, which is so exciting to say. And happy new year. We have finally arrived at 2026, which is pretty exciting. So I'm recording this when we're already halfway through the month. So I know that many of you are already planning out your year, planning out your goals, setting new intentions, and all of that great stuff. So today I thought I would start the year off by talking about how we can either reset our habits or start new habits. This is something that has come up, and even for myself, because one of my intentions for this year is to stop making excuses. That's like number one for me. It has totally stopped me from making progress from all sorts of things from my fitness goals to my personal growth, my podcast goals, all of that. Like I literally make excuses for so many things, and it's something this year that I've decided I need to stop because I've noticed that there's always gonna be excuses, and then I'm gonna be upset at myself for not doing what I need to do. So, number one, that's one of my intentions for this year is stop making excuses. Stop making excuses for the things that I want to accomplish. Another thing that I want to stop this year is procrastination. So believe it or not, these are habits that are repetitive behaviors. We do these things automatically without effort. So, in order to break habits, we need to learn how to create new ones or even like reset the habits that you are already doing or you want to do or you want to be better at because the brain prefers what's familiar. Anytime that you are trying to do something new, the brain is going to reject it. We have to work hard in the beginning when we're trying to start something new. So, really, it's about you trying to do those uncomfortable things until becomes routine and it becomes easy. You won't have to think about it, you'll just do it. For an example, one example that I could use is my vitamins. Vitamins is something that I've been wanting to get really good at, and I just would forget over and over and over. And in order for me to get better at this and for this to become a pretty easy process where I don't even have to think about it, I had to be intentional and I had to set some things up. So, for instance, I created a pill box, I put it at my desk where I'm at every single morning, and I see it and I take them, and it's so much easier now. So now I don't even have to add it as an intention or goal or anything like that because it's already routine. I know that every morning I take my vitamins and it's an easy process now, versus in the beginning where I would constantly forget. And the reminder is that it's not you, it's your brain. Like I said previously, it is that your brain likes familiarity, it's hard for it to form new processes in the brain. And so, in order for you to get really good and to really focus on becoming more routine with your habits, it is a process that we have to become very intentional with. So, if this is something you want to work on this year, you are in the right place because no matter what it is for you, excuses, procrastination, laziness, even if we truly want to create and stick to habits that are good for us, we can totally do it. And your brain is not in charge of you, you are. So, today I'm gonna share with you the trap of excuses, and I'm going to bring to you the framework from a book that is a must if you want to get really good with habits, which is called the Atomic Habits Book. And so, I'm gonna go with you and I'm gonna talk to you about the framework that he went through, and I'm gonna help you to understand how you can implement it yourself so that you can get better with your habits. So, we are gonna start with the trap of excuses. And the reason we're starting with excuses is because that's usually where things usually start, right? There's always gonna be an excuse for us not doing the things that we want to do. So excuses will always be there, right? Time, money, I'm tired, I should be doing this instead. And the truth is that excuses serve as a way to deflect responsibility for your action or inaction, and it's often hiding the deeper reason. So the more that you rely on excuses, the less likely we are to take action and we stay stuck, which then leads to a lack of growth, which never feels good. You then criticize yourself for being stuck, and then eventually you quit on whatever it is that you want to do. Think about it. Think about a time when you wanted to get really good at something. Maybe it's fitness, maybe it's learning a new skill, and because you have given yourself excuses and you're not consistent with it, and then you don't get better, you end up quitting, you end up saying, I'm not good at this, or this doesn't work out for me, and you end up quitting. So it's not you, it's just the science of how the brain works, and excuses provides us a temporary buffer, it like shields us from the discomfort of facing our difficulties or our challenges. So, in a sense, it's like a psychological shield. So they try to protect us from the feeling that we're not good enough or that we're gonna fail at that thing, right? So if you are starting something new, sometimes it feels really uncomfortable to do the thing, to start doing the thing. You then come up with excuses as to why you don't want to do that thing because you are trying to stop yourself from feeling like you're not good enough or this isn't gonna work out. Excuses protect us from judgment from others, right? Because again, if you're trying to do something new, you don't want to get judged if you fail at it or if you're not doing it the way that you should. It protects us from our own low self-esteem, it protects us from not seeing progress fast enough, right? But this year we are deciding that we want better for ourselves, and all we need is to create a system that has shown to work. For instance, many times we what I hear from people is I'm lazy, right? I'm not good enough, I'm not good at this, I suck at this. And a lot of times it's because I've I've seen myself in that trap too. I've seen myself like I remember, especially being like busy, like work and my other job and all of the things that I have to do. Sometimes my house is not the cleanest or the most organized. And many times what I say to myself is, I'm just a messy person, right? Like I don't know how to organize, I'm not good at this. But what I've realized is that when I set up systems, right, when I set up routines to get things done, it's not that I don't want to do it, that I want to live in a messy house, right? It's that I do not do a good job of setting up my time, setting up, you know, these routines. And once I start doing that, I've realized I am not a messy person. I'm just an overwhelmed person with lack of time, right? So again, it's about helping yourself to realize that it is not you, okay? You're not a bad mom, you're not a messy person, you're not a lazy person. You just don't have systems in place that are helping you. Because again, when we go back to the brain, right? The brain likes what it already does. Like, don't try to give me anything new because I don't like it. And this is why when you're starting something new, like a diet, like a workout program, like a new job, those types of things, it feels so hard and so uncomfortable. And so we have to remind ourselves of that. Remind ourselves that it's the brain who's having a hard time with this. But I want this, I want to start this exercise program, I want to start this change, and so I literally have to learn how I can do this in a way that's gonna be helpful to me. And I'm gonna share with you the framework from the book Atomic Habits. So if you've never heard of the book Atomic Habits, Atomic Habits is a book by James Clear, and basically it's a practical guide to building good habits and breaking bad ones. And the core idea is that you don't need to make massive overnight changes to transform your life, but instead, you should focus on atomic habits, small 1% improvements that compound over time. So in today's episode, I'm gonna share with you the framework. I'm gonna break it down for you, and I'm gonna help you see that creating habits can be something you can totally do. I've actually implemented a lot of these frameworks, I've shared these with clients to really improve different habits that they want to do, and it's really simple. So we're gonna get right into it. Okay, so he has four, he calls them laws. So I'm gonna share what they are real quick, and then I'm gonna go to each one. Law number one is make it obvious, cue. Number two is make it attractive, craving, number three, make it easy response, and number four, make it satisfying reward. So I'm gonna go through each one with you so that you can understand what this is and how easy it is to implement. Okay. So number one is make it obvious. And so with number one, you want to design your environment to make the cues for good habits visible and the ones for bad habits invisible. You can use the habit stacking and planning method. So, for instance, whatever the habit it is that you want to do, you want to create a cue for it, almost like a little reminder, right? Because again, your brain is not used to this, this is brand new for you. And so, if you don't make it visible, if you don't make it obvious, it's gonna be really hard for you to be consistent with this habit. One of the things that I usually tell my clients is that our brain is not made to remember those little things, everything, because there's just so much going on. We have so much stimulation, and so when you're starting to when you're starting a new habit, you can't just think rely on your memory, that's not gonna work, it's gonna fail you every single time. And what you want to do is you wanna implement certain things. So, number one is just make it obvious. For instance, if I want to start drinking water, and this is a true story, so I'll just share my own. I wanted to start drinking more water. The number one thing that I do, right, make it obvious is I'm going to put my water bottle everywhere that I'm at. So, for instance, in the morning, I'm gonna put it right on the kitchen counter because I know as soon as I wake up, the kitchen is right there and I'll see it, right? Make it obvious. If I'm at work, I'm gonna put this water bottle on my desk and it's gonna be right there to again cue me, remind me that I need to drink water. Another thing that I do is I implement little timers. So I put timers into my phone like appointments, and this is going to cue my brain that this is something that I need to do. Okay, so that's an example of number one, make it obvious. And the second thing he talked about was also when you wanna stop a habit. So, for instance, if you want to stop scrolling your phone at night, you want to put your phone away somewhere away from where you're at. So, for instance, if you wanna read at night, put your phone in another room or put your phone in a drawer. That way it's not in your face because once the phone is in your face, you know you're gonna touch it, you know you're gonna see the alert, you know you're gonna grab it. So, again, it's the same thing with that, right? It's don't make it obvious. So if you want to stop doing something, don't make it obvious, put it away. If you want to start something, make it obvious, put it right in your face. Number two is make it attractive, increase the appeal of good habits by pairing them with enjoyable activities known as the temptation bundling. So, for instance, this would be make it fun. One of the things I do in order to do the habits that I need to do. For instance, I need to wash dishes, right? With something we need to do. For you, it might be something different. But what I do is I pair it with listening to an audiobook or listening to music. So that way, as I'm doing the dishes, I'm listening to something enjoyable. Working out. Working out works great when you make it fun. So, again, that could be creating a really fun playlist that you can listen to when you are working out. A playlist with music that's just gonna keep make you feel energetic. Um, maybe it's listening to a podcast that really gets you going. I used to listen to a podcast where it would, I don't think it was a podcast, maybe it was a YouTube video, but it was a motivational um video. And so as I'm working out, I'm listening to someone in my ears just talking about, you know, ways to be motivated and inspirational. And it was really cool because it did increase my like dopamine, like it made me feel good, and that feel good energy was really good when I was working out. So make it attractive. Number three is make it easy, reduce the friction associated with good habits by simplifying the process and try the two-minute rule, which suggests starting with a habit that takes less than two minutes to complete. Okay, so let's use my drinking water example. So, my drinking water example is I want to drink 64 ounces. The way that I'm doing it to make it easy is I got myself a 32-ounce water bottle, and so now I know that I need to drink two of these a day. Versus if you have like I know I've had smaller water bottles, like 16, and then it's kind of confusing because I'm like, how many did I drink? Did I drink two? Did I drink three? How much more do I have to go? And with this, it's so much easier. So I literally fill it up in the morning and I try to drink it by at least 12 p.m. And by 12 p.m. I refill it, and then I know that I have just 32 more ounces to go by the end of the day, and boom, I hit my goal. It's so much easier. Another thing that has helped that I've heard can be really helpful is when you're trying to have a workout plan. Sometimes when you want to work out more, it gets confusing because you go to the gym and you don't even know what you want to do. So instead, you would create you would create little workout plans. So you might say, This is what I personally do myself now, and it's made it so much easier and so much more enjoyable because I don't have to think about it. I literally work out three times a week. One day I do upper body, one day I do lower body, one day I do full body, and I literally create five exercises for each day. So I have a little index card, and in that index card, it tells me on upper body day, these are the five exercises that I'm doing. On lower body day, these are the five five exercises I'm doing. Because before it was like, all right, I want to do upper body, but let me think. Should I do this exercise? Maybe I'll look up some exercises and it makes it, it just makes it hard. Now it's easy, right? I just pull out my card. Today's an upper body day. I have the exercises already there. Again, with the water bottle, I don't have to think about it. I fill it up in the morning. I know that I want to drink this by 12 p.m. And by 12 p.m., boom, I fill it up again and I don't have to think about it. So again, you want to make it easy. You don't want to make it so hard that it's hard for you to get these things done, and it's hard for you to be consistent with it. So make it as easy as possible. Another one could be making easy for workouts. It could be have your workout outfit ready already. One thing I personally do too is I have a gym bag ready at all times. So that way, if I'm at work and I have time and I want to go to the gym, I do it. If I'm at home on certain days, the gym bag's already done. I don't have to look through my drawers for clothes. My clothes are laid out, my sneakers are there, I have everything I need. I have my workout plan already done, and it's so much easier. Now I don't have to think about it. I make it very, very easy. And number four is make it satisfying. Reward yourself for good habits, make sure they're satisfying. This is going to reinforce the behavior. So you have to think about it this way. We're not so different than our kids, right? Our kids love earning rewards, they love those behavior charts, they love getting those stickers. Well, we could do the same thing, especially when you're first starting something new. So, for instance, and it has to be immediate and it has to be satisfying, it has to be something that you really enjoy. So it might be pairing an activity that you really enjoy doing with that habit. So, for instance, after I work out, I go and do that activity. Maybe I go and have a special drink, a special treat. Maybe I'm working on meal planning. And so maybe when I finish doing my meal plans, or maybe when I finish creating meal prepping, whatever it is that I'm doing, I'm gonna pair that with something enjoyable. So after that, I'm gonna go and watch my favorite TV show, or after I go to the gym, I'm gonna go to that smoothie place and get my favorite smoothie, or I'm gonna go to my favorite coffee shop and get a coffee, whatever it is for you. It doesn't have to be anything like that. It could be in your habit tracker, it could be something where you highlight that I've got it done. I personally am starting the punch card for this year. I'm not sure if you heard about it, but basically, what it is is you identify different habits that you want to be consistent with, and then you would fill in or punch out a hole into each one. And when you get to like 10, you give yourself a little reward. And so for me, every time I meet my 64 ounces of water, I get to color in one of the spots, and now it's fun because now I look at it, and when I'm complete the 10, I believe the reward I gave myself is go on a coffee date because I really want to go to like a coffee shop, and so now I'm halfway through that, and so for me the reward is filling in that little space and knowing that I have five more to go, so I that's really keeping me not only keeping me consistent, but it's a fun way of doing it. I am so excited to make sure that I get my water goal met for the day so I can fill in the next one because now I'm already counting the days. I'm like, all right, five more days I get to go on this cool coffee date with someone. So that's a way that you can do it. Everyone's different, so your reward will be up to you. It has to be immediate because it's the way the brain works, right? If you can give it like this nice little reward right when you do it, it's going to reinforce that for next time. Okay, so that's all four of the laws. I'm gonna review them for you just so that you can remember. And law number one is make it obvious, law number two is make it attractive, law number three is make it easy, and law number four is make it satisfying. All right, so now how do I get started? So, number one, I want you to audit your environment because I want you to design your space for success. So if you want to eat healthier, put healthy snacks in places that you will see them, such as the counter, put them in front of a cabinet, and put away any unhealthy foods. Just like we talked about the Phone scrolling. If you want to drink more water like me, have your water bottle handy so you can have it close by for easy access. Number two is focus on identity, not your goals. Instead of I want to lose weight, say I am a person who eats healthy. I am a person who moves her body every day. So you want to focus on identity versus goals. So that way that can be something that you can align with. Number three, forget the slip-ups. Never miss twice. If you miss once, it's okay. But if you miss twice, then then you are starting a new habit. So again, forgive yourself if you messed up and start again the next day, the next moment. Do not let that become a habit of you just getting mad at yourself and then giving up. Okay. Alright, so I'm gonna I gave you some examples throughout this episode, but I wanted to give you one from start to beginning so that you can kind of see how this can work for you. So my example is I want to start lifting weights three times a week. So number one, the cue, I put in calendar reminders, I set it as an appointment, and I get reminders an hour before. So that is making it obvious, right? I'm making it obvious, I'm putting a calendar reminder. And if I work out at 5 30 by 4 30, it sends me a reminder, upper body day, and that is my reminder that oh, that's right, I have to do this. And also it reminds me that I'm not gonna come up with an excuse. I've already planned this, it's already part of my day. There's no excuse for me. If I'm tired, I'm still gonna do it. If there's something more important that I think needs to be done, I have to remind myself to just do this and then I'll do that. But again, it is a cue, it is a reminder. Number two, make it fun. So I create a playlist of my favorite songs, and that really motivates me during my workout. And like I said before, I already have the workout completed, so it is an easier process. Number three, make it easy. I will have my gym bag all packed, I have my workouts already planned, so it's easy, I don't have to think about it, and it makes it so much easier. And number four, the reward. So after I'm done, I get to give myself a relaxing stretch. And like I mentioned earlier, I have my punch card, I get to fill in or punch out one of the areas, making me closer to that reward. Okay, so this is a reminder that in order for us to get better with our habits, especially the ones that we really, really want to get better with, we really have to set up a system. We cannot rely on our memory, we cannot rely on our willpower, it just doesn't work, right? Because we're gonna have excuses. For instance, if maybe if I do want to get consistent with my workouts, this is something that I've dealt with, right? But I don't have the workout set up and I don't want to mentally like mentally, it's too much work for me to try to figure that out. So I just say, you know what, forget it. I'm not gonna do it today. I'll kind of like come up with a workout and maybe I'll do it tomorrow, right? And that's an excuse. Or maybe I come home and I realize, you know what, I really want to clean the kitchen, but I've learned that if I don't stick to this routine, it's not gonna happen. So I'll clean the kitchen, I feel good, and then my body is like, I want to exercise, so it doesn't happen, right? So again, it's make it as easy as possible, make it consistent, make it obvious, make it rewarding. All of those great things are good systems for us to be consistent with our with our routines, with our habits. I will say that ever since I've implemented this in my own life in the beginning of this year, I have actually become extremely more consistent with those health habits that I'm really trying to work on. And now I can incorporate this into other things that I want to be more consistent with, such as, you know, recording the podcast and writing a blog and all of those types of things. Because again, it's all about me setting myself up for success, knowing that when I think about excuses, it's just excuses, it's just stopping me from doing the uncomfortable thing, doing the thing that I'm thinking is gonna be a lot of work, thinking is not gonna be fun, right? And so we have to set that up. We have to make it fun, make it fun, you know, set up a reward for yourself. Do what you need to do in order to be more consistent with your habits and your goals, right? Because the people who are consistent, they're not they don't have more willpower, they don't, they're not more motivated than us. They have systems like this in place that they just follow. They just follow, you know. So for me, it's like I know excuses are the thing that stops me from doing the things I want to do, such as exercising and be a healthier person. And now I come home and I'm like, Kayla, you're not gonna, you're not, nope, we're not doing it. I don't care if you're tired, I don't care if the kitchen needs to be cleaned up. We already set it up. We got the calendar reminder that we need to work out, so you're gonna get home, maybe give yourself like 10 minutes to just decompress, change, and then go upstairs and go work out. Okay. So this is a reminder that again, it's not you, it's the systems, it's your intentions, and it's what you do every single day that really matters. And I have faith in you. I know that you can do this, I know that it is possible, and also I know what it feels like when you feel that you are just not good at this, right? I've seen I've heard it, I've heard the people saying to me, like, I'm a bad mom, like I'm a messy person, I'm not good at this, I'll never get this done. I know I've said this to myself, but this year we're not gonna do that. This year we're not gonna let excuses, we're not gonna let that inner critic get in the way of us, and we're gonna become more consistent with our goals, and we are gonna get more better with the habits that we need to do. So I truly hope that this was helpful to you as we're starting this new year. I know that it's helpful for me. I know that I've been seeing a lot of videos and podcasts on habits, and I know we're all trying to start this year with just being a better like person, being better with our habits, being better with doing the things that we really want to intend for ourselves so we can feel happier, healthier, have more energy, and all that great stuff. And before ending today's episode, I wanted to ask you to share this episode with someone that you know needs to hear this. I know that there's plenty of people I know that could really use this advice and this information to better their habits. And lastly, one great way that you can support my show is by leaving me a rating and review. It doesn't take a lot of time and it does so much for the show. I would be so grateful if you can do that this year. I really want to see the ratings. I really want to hear more about how people are loving the show and give me feedback. I don't care what kind of feedback it is, just give me feedback so that I can make the show better and better and better. Okay, that's all for today. I hope that you enjoyed this episode, and I hope to talk to you again next week. Take care. Thank you so much for joining this conversation today. I hope this episode was helpful to you on your healing journey. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode packed with valuable tips and insights designed to empower you. If you found value in this episode, I'd be so grateful if you left me a review wherever you're listening from and share your thoughts and feedback. This really helps me to reach more women just like you. Thanks for listening.