Habits You Should Ditch: 20 Bad Habits That Are Holding You Back

Bad habits are like a comfortable bed, easy to get into, but hard to get out of.” – Anonymous

Habits make the man. Or in some cases bad habits can unmake the man.

On DGH we talk about how to improve habits all the time. But what about all those bad habits.

We all have a few habits we’d like to break. 

So what can we do about them?

Well we have the answer for you.

To start, we recommend reading this post to learn how to break bad habits. It will give you a process you can use to get rid of any bad habit.

Now, there are certain bad habits that can really get in the way of achieving personal success. In this article, we’ll cover 20 habits that might be holding you back.

20 Bad Habits That Hold You Back

1. Procrastinating on Important Tasks

At some time or another everyone procrastinates. The important thing to decide if the procrastination is just putting a task off for a much needed break or if it is a chronic thing that affects your work.

If your procrastination causes you to do inferior work. If boss, family, friends or coworkers complain about your procrastination. Or if you know it negatively affects your work. Your procrastination is a problem and you will have to do something about it.

Above are some of the basic keys stopping procrastination. I get it…. Easier said than done.

If you want a more detailed guide that will help guide you through the path of stopping procrastination forever check out the link below.

2. Overspending and Exceeding Your Budget

Are you always broke. Feel like your bills keep growing and growing. Credit cards out of control? Does your debt feel like a mountain on your chest?

If any of those sound familiar you might have a spending problem, and either need to earn more or spend less. The steps to spending less are not that difficult, but few people take the time or effort to follow them.

Even if you are wealthy, following the good spending habits below can help you.

Want more details on “how” and “why” many financial habits are so important? Check out this post below on spending habits that will set you right.

3. Being Addicted to Mindless Entertainment Holds you Back

I will freely admit that this is one of my current bad habits. I work hard and I keep myself mostly on the strait and narrow path when it comes to habits, so I allow myself to indulge in reading for pure enjoyment.

There is nothing wrong with this, as it is kept to a minimum. If I was not able to occasionally read a book like Ready Player One or Girl on the Train. I would go mad. But when you compromise work or life, it is something that needs to be dealt with.

Rather than never allowing yourself to read books for enjoyment, why not try this habit. Before you allow yourself the free time to read for fun make yourself read educational nonfiction for at least 30 minutes a day first.

4. Spending Too Much Time on Social Media

Social media has become as addicting as having that cup of coffee every morning. The temporarily gratification we get from the number of “likes’ and views on the pictures and videos we post, has many wanting more.

Not only does social media keep us from creating solid lifelong relationships, but we are in competition with who lives the” best life”.

If quitting social media is difficult, try reducing the amount of hours you spend on it and see how your life improves.

5. Saying “Yes” to Everyone

We’re all guilty of saying yes to things and people, when we really want to say no. The fear of being judged or disliked, has us taking on more than we can handle at times.

Even when we try to convince ourselves that we won’t say yes again, we get scared, tense up and end up saying yes.

The fear of being rejected or coming off as unkind and rude, keeps us from saying no because we all want to be liked.

Saying no doesn’t make you a bad person, it means you chose not to commit your time to doing things you don’t want.

6. Multitasking Decreases Productivity

Everyone wants to be more productive by producing more in a short amount of time. It’s even listed on some job requirements as a “must” to be considered for the position. 

However, there has been many studies conducted proving that the human brain is incapable of multitasking efficiently. You are simply shifting the focus from one task to another while trying to complete the two at a rapid pace.

See more habits habits that negatively affect your productivity by checking the link below:

7. Focusing on Negative Thinking

Negative thinking is fear based, we play negative scenarios in our minds as a way of protecting ourselves of the unknown.

This type of thinking keeps us from growing, keeps us from taking chances and risks in life as a way of staying “safe”.

If you want to change your life, you must change your thinking.

8. Being Late

I had a friend in high school who had a fear of being late, so she would show up to school and all events 15 minutes early. Her explanation was, she didn’t want to be rude and come off as being unprepared.

The real reason most of us are late anywhere is simple, we just don’t want to be early. We don’t bother putting in the extra effort it takes to being on time because, it’s not  important to us. Deep down, we know the people expecting us, will forgive or dismiss our disregard for being late.

If someone promised you a million dollars and all you had to do was meet them the next day at the address they provided, would you be late? It really comes down to what is important to us and the saying “we make time for things we want”.

9. Stress Eating Holds you Back

​Using food to make us feel better has become a coping mechanism many of us use to deal with stress, boredom and loneliness.

It’s important to distinguish when your body is hungry vs when your emotions are asking to be fed. Emotional hunger shouldn’t be satisfied because the emotions that trigger your hunger will remain there after you consume the calories.

There are healthier ways to dealing with your emotions, understanding that food is for fuel and not for comfort.

10. Being Jealous of Other People is Holding you Back

We have all experienced jealousy in some form, obsessing over what others have, vacations we aren’t able to take and the romantic relationship we can’t attain.

Being jealous doesn’t change anything, it's a waste of time to envy others that are more fortunate than you.

Growling and grinding your teeth while you watch others succeed, will only make you unhappy.

11. Taking on More Than You Can Handle is Holding you Back

When you have the “disease to please” you tend to say “yes” to everyone and everything, without first thinking how you’ll make it happen.

The fear of saying no, feeling invaluable or the need to stay busy, all come with a price we pay that may not always be worth the reward.

Putting off quality time with loved ones because you decided to take on one more project at work, will have long terms effects. It’s impossible to pile on so much without it hindering other areas of your life.

It’s important to weight out the risks and rewards of committing your time to take on, one more task.

One of the hardest things to do is to say no to constant requests for help. But it is something you must do. When you constantly take on new tasks and help others with their work it is easy to get bogged down to the point where you accomplish nothing.

The post below goes into detail on why “NO” is should be one of the most important words in your vocabulary when it comes to staying productive.

12. Getting Distracted is Holding you Back

We are living in a time where we would rather walk out of the house without shoes before we can allow ourselves to forget our phones.

Our phones have become the number one distraction, it’s the first thing most of  reach for when we open our eyes in the morning. It’s become a habit to immediately check our emails, scroll through social media for the latest or sending texts to remind others you’re important.

13. Hitting the Snooze on Your Alarm 

When you constantly hit the snooze button, you are training the mind to think that you have a few more minutes, rather then it’s time to  “get up”.

If you’re hitting snooze because of a poor night’s sleep, figuring out how to get to sleep on time, will be beneficial to quitting your snooze habit.

But, if you are getting a good night's sleep and still hitting the snooze alarm you need to work on tricks to keep you from doing it. Like putting the alarm across the room rather than within arms reach.

14. Making Frequent Assumptions is holding you back

When we perceive something a certain way that isn’t true, we are assuming.

The habit of constantly assuming means you are living in a world that is false, because you have no facts to back up your belief.

This can lead to other unhealthy habits like low self-esteem because you are believing your thoughts, which aren’t always true.

15. Complaining is holding you back

It’s no surprise that the people who have developed a habit for complaining, are those who see the glass “half empty” in everything. These are the people who regardless of having what they need in life, will still find something to complain about.

Complaining does not only keep you from being happy, it also stalls taking action on any dreams or goals. You’ll find a reason to complain about how difficult things are and eventually give up, never knowing what could have been.

This habit can be a little tricky to drop, you must change your thinking and become aware of when you are complaining.

16. Blaming Others holds you back

It takes a pretty big person to take responsibility for their own actions, but that not always the case with many of us.

From an early age, we learn that being “bad” is not something you want to be. The feeling that you’ve disappointed or upset someone you care about, is not a good one and you’ll do almost anything to never let it happen again.

This is where the “blame game” comes into play, because you stop taking responsibility and begin to blame others for your actions.

17. Doubting Yourself just Keeps you from Success

Feeling uncertain at times, is normal, we all experience a time where we aren’t sure of things in our lives. When this self-doubt becomes habitual, it can lead to many other serious problems.

Constantly doubting ourselves can lead to depression, anxiety and even high blood pressure. The inner voice that convinces you that you aren’t good enough, keeps you from living your dreams and setting goals because you’ll always expect the worse.

18. Fearing Change Keeps you from Improving

If you’re always scared of changing what is familiar, you’ll never discover that the world has so much more to offer.

There are so many of us out there, who aren't comfortable modifying areas in our lives because we are afraid of what we don’t “know”. This is not a desirable way to experiences life.

Being afraid of changing will only keep you stuck in areas that aren’t the best for you. Like the unfulfilling job or relationship you know you should leave but don’t because you’re scared.

On some level fear of change is just fear of failure. People are comfortable with what they know but are scared of failing and making a comfortable existence worse. See a great way to overcome your fear of failure in the link below.

19. Giving Up Just Ensures you will not Succeed

When the going gets “tough” most of us find a way to talk ourselves out of the situation. This can be anything from a gym regimen, eating anything and anything else that causes us to “work hard”.

I’m guilty of this myself, I can’t count how many diets I’ve been on, money i’ve wasted in gym memberships, times i’ve decided i would go back to school for a degree, only to quit halfway through.

Every time I decided this time was going to be different, that I would commit, I found myself making excuses to quit before I ever began.

The point is, I never committed to finish anything, I always felt the reward was never worth the work. Quitting has kept me from getting my dream job, losing the excess weight and looking great.

20. Mind Reading holds you back

Final Thoughts on Bad Habits to Break

As human, we develop bad habits as a way of dealing with stress, our relationships and the people in our lives.

A bad habit as small as overspending while out shopping to reading mindless entertainment can be simply do to being bored.  (In fact, there are 283 bad habits that many people have.)

The good part is that all bad habits can be replaced with good habits, you just need to take the necessary steps to develop them. If you get stuck, then I recommend checking out the step-by-step process we recommend for breaking habits.

I’ll leave you with two simple questions:

1. Do you do any of the 20 bad habits that I just listed?
2. If so, what are you doing TODAY to ditch them?

Comment below and share your thoughts…

Finally, if you need help with building habits, then check out this nine-step blueprint that walks you through the entire process of creating lifelong habits.)