Elastic Habits

How to Create Smarter Habits That Adapt to Your Day

By: Stephen Guise

Narrated by: Daniel Penz

Length: 6 hrs and 36 mins

Publisher's summary

Habits that bend don’t break.

Why do so many sincere attempts to build good habits fail?

We try our best to be consistent, but some days are better than others. Inevitably, we fail when "life happens", because each day we try to hit the same targets regardless of the situations we face. How, then, can we make our habits more resilient to the turbulence of life?

By making them elastic.

Most people associate "elastic" with yoga pants and rubber bands. But the word also means "resilient" - the ability to withstand pressure. Elastic materials are far more durable than rigid and brittle ones, which will shatter under pressure. The same is true for habits.

A traditional habit is unchanging: The same behavior is done at the same time to the same level every day. It works well until the pressures of modern life break its rigid and brittle shell. Elastic habits are fluid: They can change their form and intensity to suit each unique day. They survive busy, tired, bad days. They thrive in better days.

A standard habit has one win condition. An elastic habit has nine. If traditional habits are a hammer, elastic habits are your grandfather’s garage. When you’re working on a house project, it’s not a burden to have a hammer, a wrench, and a screwdriver - you just select the one you need when you need it. Elastic habits are the same.

If you’re tired of the repetitive and exhausting grind to develop good habits, it’s time to give your habits the refreshing superpower of elasticity. Listen to Elastic Habits now, and you’ll soon discover the life-changing difference of good habits that adapt to your day.

©2019 Selective Entertainment LLC (P)2019 Selective Entertainment LLC

Practical advice

Easy to understand and encourages implementation. Easy to take action on right away. Highly recommend this book.

The Elastic Habits' Review

The Elastic Habits' ideas were well thought-out and helpful. However, the ending chapters were unnecessarily wordy.

Excellent new ideas for sticking to your habits

Really easy to listen to, with a lot new ideas and good examples for forming new habits! Extremely easy to implement and with a completely new idea to what habits and promises to your self can ne and how you can manage them on a elastic way.

Not as good as Guise's other books.

A few good points. Not sure it needed a new book. It could have been a shorter book.

A good system, but more wordy than it needs to be

I have mixed feelings about this book. I really liked the author’s idea of an elastic system of habits that adapts to your changing needs. However, Nietzsche once wrote, “It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what others say in a whole book.” I feel like this author would do well to adopt a similar ambition. He takes too long to get to the point and uses too many awkward metaphors.

Here are some of the things I appreciated about this book. The discussion of strengths and weaknesses of different sized goals was interesting. I liked the idea of lateral and vertical flexibility and being able to choose between mini, plus, and elite goals each day. There are plenty of examples to understand how the system works (too many examples really—they would have been better in an appendix).

I loved the idea of connecting your habits with your values. This is one area where I might actually have preferred a few more examples. I also appreciated the advice about which habits to prioritize, making the elastic habit system efficient, and avoiding choice paralysis and decision fatigue. I’m not inclined to want to track and score habits, but I can appreciate why that would be helpful for some people.

I thought Daniel Penz had a pleasant voice and generally did a fine job narrating. You miss some graphics if you listen to the audiobook, but I don’t think they’re essential to understand the material. And the author has thoughtfully provided these graphics on his website, accessible without signing up. I loved the comic for smarter strategies.

I think the elastic habit system would appeal to many people, but the book requires considerable patience. If the author had conveyed the content more concisely, I think this would appeal more to the target audience. It wouldn’t have been so annoying in an ebook or paperback that I could have skimmed, but the audiobook really dragged.

I was given a free copy of this audiobook by the author and volunteered to provide an honest review.

Best habit book that works!!

I have read many habit books, success books, and productivity books. This seems to be the only book after reading over 100 other books that not only works but is sustainable. It is consistently working day after day. I suggest to get the book but start with “mini habits” and the “how to be an imperfectionist” because they lay the groundwork for this one.

Great Strategy For Making Habits Effective

I loved mini habits, but this takes it to the next level. I heard about Stephen Guise from “How to be an Imperfectionist,” his book which blew my mind with his take on perfectionism. His books have helped me a lot!

Flexibility for the win

Plain and simply this strategy has me back to weight training, after year of avoidance. It keeps my inner perfectionist in check. And it keeps me flexibility improving over time.

I don't use his paper system, rather I just adapted Google Keep and Google Calendar to keep me on track. The idea of tracking all my habits every day instantly turned me off. So, I use his system to set my intention every day.

Habit formation is no longer an issue

One of the best books I have ever read on habit formation.I bet you gonna take action before completing it, this book that kind powerful.

Good habits made easy

Thia book contains great actionable ideas that really help develop and reinforce good habits by making them super easy and fun.