The Power of Habit

by

Charles Duhigg

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on The Power of Habit makes teaching easy.
Tony Dungy is a highly successful American football coach who turned the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Indianapolis Colts into two of the NFL’s winningest teams. His secret was to make his players practice a few key formations over and over again, until they were automatic. This taught them to act faster and more decisively than their opponents. Dungy’s strategy shows how good habits are the key to successful teams and that the Golden Rule of habit change is the best way to develop them. However, it also shows why people have to truly believe in themselves in order to build new habits. For years, Dungy’s teams repeatedly lost key playoff games because they overthought their strategies, instead of following the routines Dungy taught them. But after Dungy’s son committed suicide, his players started to believe more sincerely in his methods and coasting to victory in the playoffs.

Tony Dungy Quotes in The Power of Habit

The The Power of Habit quotes below are all either spoken by Tony Dungy or refer to Tony Dungy . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Habits, Human Behavior, and Success Theme Icon
).
Chapter 3 Quotes

His coaching strategy embodied an axiom, a Golden Rule of habit change that study after study has shown is among the most powerful tools for creating change. Dungy recognized that you can never truly extinguish bad habits.
Rather, to change a habit, you must keep the old cue, and deliver the old reward, but insert a new routine.
That’s the rule: If you use the same cue, and provide the same reward, you can shift the routine and change the habit. Almost any behavior can be transformed if the cue and reward stay the same.

Related Characters: Charles Duhigg (speaker), Tony Dungy
Page Number: 62
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire The Power of Habit LitChart as a printable PDF.
The Power of Habit PDF

Tony Dungy Quotes in The Power of Habit

The The Power of Habit quotes below are all either spoken by Tony Dungy or refer to Tony Dungy . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Habits, Human Behavior, and Success Theme Icon
).
Chapter 3 Quotes

His coaching strategy embodied an axiom, a Golden Rule of habit change that study after study has shown is among the most powerful tools for creating change. Dungy recognized that you can never truly extinguish bad habits.
Rather, to change a habit, you must keep the old cue, and deliver the old reward, but insert a new routine.
That’s the rule: If you use the same cue, and provide the same reward, you can shift the routine and change the habit. Almost any behavior can be transformed if the cue and reward stay the same.

Related Characters: Charles Duhigg (speaker), Tony Dungy
Page Number: 62
Explanation and Analysis: