• Every morning, when I wake up, the first thing I do is to drink a glass of water.
• I can't stay a day without my phone, and off the internet.
• I always do a minimum of 10 push-ups every morning.
• I don't have a lovely day if I didn't eat jollof rice.

Okay, the last statement is a lie though. But, can you guess what I'm trying to represent? I bet few can't.

Well, the first three statements are some of my daily routines, that are registered in my subconscious. They have now become habits.

Habits are a component of any human being. Sometimes, we might be unaware of them, but, most times, we know what our habits are. Most especially the bad ones.
We all have bad habits. Maybe our good ones just tend to cover it up.
Pardon me for judging everyone fairly as having bad habits.

---

From my little write-up above, you can already guess what I will be discussing in this article.
I will be talking about Habits, and a couple of other things that are related to it.
Furthermore, I will also be reviewing an app which you could use to track your habits, form a new one, or break an old one.

The app is a Habit tracker called "LOOP".

This article is under a series a started about a month ago. The series should have ended after the first four articles were published. But, it just couldn't end because, along the line, other concepts popped up in my head.

The intention of this series was to educate you(my audience) on certain concepts. However, I ended up being schooled myself.
This series has exposed me to a lot of things I didn't know, and now I'm glad I started the series.

It is with mixed emotions that I announce the end of this series, with this last concept. Which is about Habits.

So far, I've discussed three other relevant concepts. They are;

• Time management
• Financial management
• Health management

Individually, each one of these concepts is essential for every person. But, as a unit, the end result is mind-blowing.

The combination of all the concepts I've discussed in this series will give you the best year you have ever experienced.

Getting the best out of this year using some basic concepts, led to the creation of this series.
I won't lie to you, the results have been amazing so far.

I spend my time on productive activities. The income I earn from those activities is well spent. I've managed to maintain my current weight since I started watching it.
Well, all these things can crumble if par-adventure, I form a habit that is not nice.
That is why I'm including a discussion about habits in this series.

Without further ado, let's delve into the discussion for today.

Here are the talking points I will be discussing in this article.

• What is Loop?
• How does the app work?
• Discussion about Habits.

Loop Habit Tracker: Track your habits and long-term goals.

• Do you know your habits?
• What are your habits?
• Are you trying to form or break a habit?

These are questions you might never be asked in your entire life. But, these are personal questions you should ask yourself.

You will ask why? Well, I have come to realize that our habits can affect us in so many ways possible. I will discuss that later in this article. But for now, let us discuss about the app LOOP

What is Loop?

According to the app's description on F-droid;

Loop is a simple app that helps you create and maintain good habits, allowing you to achieve your long-term goals.

The description is pretty straight forward so I wouldn't explain much.

The app is developed by Alinson Xavier but bears the username iSoron on Github.

The app has only android versions. Once again, iOS users are left out.

If you are an iOS user, I'm really sorry

The app is completely ad-free and open source.

The fact that the app is ad-free is really cool. Aside from that, there are no premium features needing payment.
Well, even if the app requires payment for premium features, I will still go ahead to use. But, I'm glad it is free.
Who doesn't like free things?

How the app works

In this section, I'm going to be talking briefly about how the app works.

When you launch the app for the first time, you are greeted with a slideshow of info.
The information on those slides isn't much though. They are basically a summary of the app's function.
I think I have talked a lot about apps having these slides or not having it.
I detest the later(not having it). Even though the slide won't contain much information, I'm just okay with its presence. It gives me this comfortable feeling when using the app.

Here is a picture of the three slides you will see when you launch the app for the first time.

After you are done with that, the next screen you will see is the main screen.
Being the first time launching the app, you should expect it to be bare.
The developer isn't omniscient to know what your habits are and preload them for you.

You could decide to do anything after you launch the app. But, creating a habit should be the first thing that comes to your mind.

Creating a Habit.

To create a habit, you simply need to click the plus (+) icon on the top right.
A form will pop up, and then you can enter the details according to the parameters you see.

The parameters are;

• Name
• Question
• Repeat
• Reminder.

Name:
Name there, doesn't imply your real name. It is the name of the Habit you wish to register.
For example, I want to form a reading habit, so I could use Bookworm as the name. That is just an example though. You can get really creative with the name if you wish.
By the side of the name bar, you will find an icon.
The icon is a theming tool. It allows you to set a color label for the habit you are creating.

Question:

The app lets you question yourself with regards to the habit you are trying to form or break.

I spend at least $10 every day. So $10 when converted to my local currency is quite a lot as basic daily expenditure.
That is, aside from other engagements that will cost money, just running the whole day costs me $10.
You might call that amount chicken change, but to me, it isn't.
So I've tried to curtail that kind of spending attitude using my expenses app, I earlier reviewed.
Well, all efforts proved abortive, so I gave up and decided to add $10 to my daily budget.

This spending attitude has been a little bit detrimental and I wish to stop this spending habit. I'd love to form a habit of spending at least $5 daily.

So, on Loop, when creating a habit, I will ask this question;

Did you spend more than $5 today?

Did you get the example? I'm sure you did.

Repeat:

Since this is something I want to engage in daily, I will set the habit to repeat itself daily.
To do this, I will select "Everyday". Aside from that, I could also set it to repeat every week, 2 times per week, or, 5 times per week. Furthermore, you can also customize the repeat sequence.

Reminder:

You can set a time for the app to remind you if you performed a routine.
So in my case, I want to be reminded when I'm done with the day. That is about 9 pm.
So I set the app to remind me by 9 pm if I spent above $5 that day.

That is all about creating a habit.

After that, you can now begin checking each day you actually met your habit target.
For example, I spent less than $5 on Monday, I will then check Monday on the app. This means I was successful that day.
If I spend above $5 on Tuesday, I will that day unchecked.

You can do this checking manually, or even from the reminder that pops up to remind you.

---

I read the FAQs document of the app and found that the app can automatically check the days for you. But, it depends on the way you set your habit pattern, in terms of days.

After all that, you can now check your stats by clicking on the habit.

I'm still trying to figure out how to read the stats though. I doubt it will take me a lot of time.

The app generates your habit score automatically. According to the developer's statement, in the FAQs document;

To compute the score of a habit, the app uses a statistical method known as exponential smoothing. Basically, it computes a weighted average that takes into consideration every repetition of the habit, from the very first day you started your habit until today. Recent repetitions, however, are considered more important than older ones, and have a larger impact on the score.

I think that's all about how the app works, or, what I'm knowledgeable about.

I originally wanted to do a separate post reviewing the app's features, but it turns out that there isn't much to talk about.

The app's user interface (UI) is sleek. It suits the app perfectly. It has night mode which is great, and I'm already using it.

The app allows you to backup your entry log. You can also export and import entry logs, which is great.

---

Brief discussion about Habits.

I decided to be very brief to avoid padding of this article. However, I will be sharing relevant links to other articles where you can learn about the subject matter properly.

What are Habits?

Here is a definition I got off the internet;

Habits are routine behaviors done on a regular basis. They are recurrent and often unconscious patterns of behavior and are acquired through frequent repetition. Many of these are unconscious as we don’t even realize we are doing them.
source

From the statement above, you can see that Habits are part of every human being. We just might not know about them. But, I think we would know about some though.

According to some articles I read, it takes about 21 days to either form or break a habit. Other articles I read differed. But, 21 days was recurrent in almost all the article I read.

Well, some of the articles talked about an experiment carried out by a plastic surgeon in the 1950s.
He performed the experiment on himself and it took him 21 days to form a new habit. Consequently, it would take the same to break one.

This theory by the surgeon received a lot of stick though. People said it was impossible to form or break a habit in 21 days.
Habits are meant to be automatic. Something you could do without actually planning to do it. People said 21 days wouldn't have been possible for a habit to become fully automatic.

Other articles I read said it would take 66 days or more to form or break a habit.
As usual, an experiment was performed to prove this fact.

I think I would go with the latter prediction. 66 days should be enough time to form or break a habit. I wouldn't also rule out the possibility of it being done in 21 days either.
In the end, I think it would depend on your own body system.

In all these, you can see why a tracker is needed, and why this app Loop is just perfect for the task.

So for 66 days, try tracking your routine based on the habit you wish to form or break.

I started mine today. Hopefully, the habit gets wiped off my life in less time.
Then I can also formulate my theory about making and breaking a habit.

Here are the links to some of the articles I read about habit;

• http://make-or-break-habits.com/what-is-a-habit/
• https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/02/how-long-it-takes-to-form-a-new-habit/
• https://jamesclear.com/new-habit
• http://www.kestrelcreek.com/wooden-zen/the-4-types-of-habits

Read those articles and gain insight.

---

Having read through this series, you might be wondering how habit tracking fits into all I've said in this series.

Well, it fits perfectly in the area of financial and weight/health tracking.

I will explain in a very simple way.

Bad spending habits will lead to financial exhaustion. Likewise, bad eating habits would lead to being overweight. Simple as that.

If I'm able to form a habit of making more and spending less, I can properly manage my finances.
If I'm properly managing my finances, it would rid me of bad eating habits, as I would spend my resources on only relevant food items.

Maybe my illustration isn't so sound, but, you get the point right?.

Summary

In this article, I have been able to review the app LOOP with respect to the concept of Habits.

During the course of drafting this article, I learned exciting new things about our psychology.

In terms of the app, Loop is a very exciting app. It provides its services efficiently. But like I always say, the app doesn't do the actual work. The work is done by you. The app is just a tool to assist you in tracking your progress. This eases the tension on your brain.
What I'm trying to say is that using the app may not break or form a habit for you. You are in charge.

With this article, I say goodbye to this series. It is with great pleasure I announce the end of this series.

What started out as something basic, became a stretched out series with lots of insightful articles.
I feel proud right now. Please permit me to.
This is the first blog series I've been able to start and end formally. It is also my longest series so far. I'm certain of longer ones in the future.

This series automatically enrolled me in a learning process I'm grateful for. From what I've seen so far, 2019 is going to be a great year for me. Just by working with the concepts discussed in this series, I'm already having lots of positive results. You can imagine what will happen by mid-year.

A little piece of advice, if you want to get the best out of your life this year and the rest of your life;

• find out what works for you.
• diligently pursue it
• don't slack

and you'll surely get it.

I already found what works for me, and it's so early in the year. I would advise you try out my way.
See how it goes for you.

Thanks for reading!

I'll love to get your feedback about this series. Please tell me what article in the series was more insightful.
Leave your comments in the comment section. Thanks.

Links

Project repository: https://github.com/iSoron/uhabits

App download link: http://f-droid.org/app/org.isoron.uhabits

Resources:

The content of this post is based on my knowledge of the project and mostly from my experience. The images used are screenshots of the app on my device. Other images gotten elsewhere have their source links provided just below them.

Series backlinks:

• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health. Part 1
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 1 contd.)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 1 contd.)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 2)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 2)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 3)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 3 contd)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 4)
• Simple mobile apps to help you manage your activities, resources, and health.(Part 4 contd)

Github profile:

https://github.com/HarryHeights