To The Ones Becoming: Forever Is The Deal With Habits

I turned a new age on Monday, and I am happy about it.
I don’t exactly know how I feel, but I know I am happy.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my 20s, especially after reading Oladimeji Ajegbile’s reflection on Substack about how our 20s won’t last forever, how they are for building, proving, urgency, and showing up publicly while pretending not to be afraid. How they are for building habits that don’t disappear overnight.

That last part is where my focus lies today: habits that don’t disappear overnight.

First, I want to say this plainly, building good habits is hard.
(This is my personal, unstable philosophy, lol.)

Building bad habits, on the other hand, is one of the easiest things on earth.

I once read about how the brain works when it comes to habits. When the brain discovers that a habit makes us happy, relaxed, or comfortable, it encourages it. But when it discovers that a habit makes us tired, worried, or stretched, it tries, out of its own version of goodwill, to protect us from that habit by discouraging it. That, in part, is why building new good habits can feel so hard. Our brain is not wicked; it is protective.

I call this belief unstable because I know that by the time I master the habits I am trying to build, my philosophy may change. I also know that the ease or difficulty of habit-building cuts across neuroscience, psychology, and philosophy. But for now, in this season of my life, it is hard, and I’m honest enough to admit that.

Lately, I’ve found myself reflecting deeply on my habits. Somewhere in The 12 Week Year, the authors say that to predict our future, all we need to look at are our present habits. To predict our financial future, we look at our financial habits today. To predict our relationship with God or with people, we look at how we relate with them now. Things don’t get better with time or chance; things get better with change.

That line stayed with me.

I began asking myself honest questions:
Am I actually making progress with these habits?
Why does it feel harder to keep showing up now than it did at the beginning?
When does the “building phase” end?

I found myself longing for the mastery phase, the automatic phase, where my 24 hours are structured, where discipline feels natural, where thinking and doing align without so much resistance. But here is the sad and very normal truth: I don’t know when that phase begins.

I see a lot of content online about how it takes 30 days or 90 days to build and master a habit. Personally, I don’t believe in that, not fully. I believe it takes every day. Showing up every day, for life. I’ve seen myself do something consistently for a while, then stop because somewhere in my head I thought I had “mastered” it. So for me, 90 days isn’t enough. I believe forever is the real deal.

This reflection helped me settle something important in my mind.

I am on a 12-week journey toward specific goals, and yes, new habits are forming along the way. But this journey is not so I can relax after 12 weeks, it is simply to achieve the goal. Will transformation happen? Yes, because the journey itself is the process. But the journey does not have an end line.

Will mastery and automation happen? Absolutely.
But not on my timeline, and maybe not in 90 days.

This shift in mindset matters to me. It helps me become more realistic and intentional with myself. Will my habits be more aligned with the life I want before my next birthday? I’m 90% sure they will. But will I reduce the intensity and intentionality I’m showing up with now? I don’t think that would be wise.

What I am changing is this: I am no longer waiting for habits to feel easy before I trust them. I am committing to them even while they feel heavy, awkward, and unfinished. What I will do differently tomorrow is simple, I will show up again, without negotiating with my feelings, without waiting for motivation to return.

My 20s are for building habits that don’t disappear overnight. Habits without a fixed timeline to mastery. Habits that expand my life, not limit it. Habits that support the woman I am becoming.

Because no matter how clear my goals, vision, or plans are, they will fail me if my habits don’t support them.

So here I am, acknowledging that building habits is hard, and at the same time reassuring myself, and you, the ones becoming, that I will keep showing up. Intentionally. Imperfectly. Persistently.

Until I become.

From my becoming,

To the ones becoming.

With love,

Olayide Juliana

A steward who believes that light shed, knowledge shared, and beliefs reviewed can make both me and the world better.

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