The last of Napoleon Hill's distilled needs for riches (or other attainment) – after desire, faith and plans – is persistence. We need to keep going despite the near-certainty we'll encounter setbacks and frustrations.

That said, Hill quickly loops persistence back to his primary need.

‘The ease with which lack of persistence may be conquered will depend entirely upon the intensity of one's desire’, writes Hill. ‘Weak desires bring weak results, just as a small amount of fire makes a small amount of heat. If you find yourself lacking in persistence, this weakness may be remedied by building a stronger fire under your desires.’

Yet there's more to persistence than desire in my opinion. There's also routine. If we can turn something into a routine it becomes automatic – just a part of our daily existence like a morning shower or coffee. Indeed, routine is stronger than just about any other impulse (including desire) because it's reinforced, rather than undermined, by inertia. Routine is our default position – what we do when not distracted or diverted elsewhere. And that makes it vital for developing persistence.

Since becoming a parent I've realized the importance of routine. Without routine, both parent and child become disoriented, with nearly all the tantrums (from both) coming about due to routine's disruption. And, as adults, we use routine as the basis for going about our daily lives, and become grumpy if they're disturbed. We like to get the same train, sit at the same desk, do reasonably similar things during the day – and then head home around the same time: only to repeat the process (hopefully) tomorrow. Of course, it's nice to voluntarily break out of the routine – perhaps with a holiday. But we're comforted by the knowledge our routine awaits: the train still leaves, the chair sits vacant, our job remains open.

Involuntarily losing our routine can be a shock. Of course, this is true with major props, such as our job or home life. But it's also true when it comes to those mundane daily rituals. Disruptions discomfort us. Like stones thrown into a millpond – the ripples have to dissipate (into a new routine) before we can, once again, feel comfortable.

Wasteful routines

So our love of routine can offer clues regarding our struggles to overcome our unproductive state. Perhaps we've fallen into an ineffective – or even wasteful – routine, with the inertia generated by all routines leading us, in this case, down a path to nowhere.

This is a common occurrence, wonderfully illustrated in the 2002 comedy About a Boy. Wastrel Will Freeman (Hugh Grant) declares himself amazed how his days are filled with apparently-important but utterly-pointless routines. He even deploys a seemingly-efficient organization for his indolent lifestyle – dividing his daily activities into 30-minute units consisting of elements such as having a bath (one unit), watching a quiz show (one unit), playing snooker (three units) etc.

‘I often wonder if I'd even have time for a job,’ he declares. ‘How do people cram them in?’

So poor routines can develop almost unconsciously, and quickly grow to dominate our lives – making routine potentially a major prop for inefficiency.

Of course, the answer is to replace our weak routines with a stronger version. How we achieve this is the obvious next question, although – again – Napoleon Hill has the answer: habit. Think and Grow Rich repeatedly emphasizes the fact we're beholden to our habits, whether good or bad. Yet our habits are a choice within our control, claims Hill, which means good habits can and will result from sheer determination.

The habit loop

Thankfully, today's writers are less proselytizing. In The Power of Habit (2012), New York Times journalist Charles Duhigg focuses on the extraordinary role habit plays with respect to even our simplest choices. He claims that neurological experiments in the 1990s found that habits are formed in the basal ganglia, a core area of the brain found even in animals such as fish or birds (that are not known for their intelligence). This means there's something deeply basic about habits. They're as automatic as breathing or swallowing in terms of brain function.

The habit-forming routine within our brain is part of a three-step loop, writes Duhigg. First, there's a trigger or cue telling our brain to go into automatic mode. This could be a sight, sound or smell – anything that creates a cue for unconscious action. Second, is the action itself – the routine. And third is the reward. The reward is key because that's why the cue has triggered the routine: to get the reward.

Of course, it's easy to see how bad habits such as smoking or alcohol addiction develop from the cue–routine–reward loop. Yet good habits such as using toothpaste also emerge from the same loop. Indeed, as Duhigg points out, this more positive habit (of brushing our teeth) offers clues regarding how to build persistence from developing good habits.

He uses the example of Pepsodent – a toothpaste popularized by Claude Hopkins, an advertising pioneer working in the US around 1900. His early advertising for the product focused on ‘tooth film’, as he called mucin plaques (a naturally occurring membrane that had previously gone largely unnoticed). In fact, Pepsodent was no more effective at ridding teeth of the film than eating an apple, but that didn't stop Hopkins running campaign ads telling people to run their tongue across their teeth in order to feel the film (the cue). Once felt, the only way to remove the film, claimed the ads, was through using Pepsodent (the routine), which left teeth feeling and looking clean (the reward).

Sales of Pepsodent soared. Soon it was selling worldwide and led to a leap in American toothpaste use from 7 percent of households prior to Pepsodent to 65 percent just ten years' later.

And, according to Duhigg, the same formula can develop habits right across the behavioural spectrum.

‘Studies of people who have successfully started new exercise routines, for instance,’ says Duhigg, ‘show they are more likely to stick with a workout plan if they choose a specific cue, such as running as soon as they get home from work, and a clear reward, such as a beer or an evening of guilt-free television.’

‘It explains everything,’ concludes Duhigg, ‘from why it's so hard to ignore a box of doughnuts to how a morning jog can become a nearly effortless routine.’

Duhigg quotes a 2002 study by the New Mexico State University that sets out to understand the power of cravings in creating habits. It examined 266 individuals with a workout habit of at least three times a week. While many had taken up exercise on a whim – perhaps because they had spare time or were stressed – the reason they continued (to the point it became an ingrained habit) was due to the specific reward the exercise triggered. It made them ‘feel good’ was the answer of 92 percent of respondents in one group, meaning they craved the endorphins and other neurochemicals that exercise released.

So, while the cue could be simple – such as leaving your running shoes by the bed so they're their first sight each morning – the reward is specific, with one (the cue) immediately triggering the routine that would deliver the other (the reward).

Figure 3 Charles Duhigg's cue–routine–reward loop

Bad habit replacement

Duhigg's book is wonderfully liberating for the unproductive person. It simply says we've developed disabling cue–routine–reward habits. Yet, once recognized as such, they can be replaced with more enabling ones. Perhaps boredom (the cue) triggers the routine of surfing the internet or leaving our desk that delivers the reward (stimulation). Perhaps distraction (the cue) triggers the routine of going to the vending machine that delivers the reward (chocolate-induced serotonin release). Or maybe anxiety (the cue) triggers the routine of distraction that delivers the reward (avoiding tackling our problems).

However we organize it, habits may be the reason we remain unproductive, despite our full knowledge they're potentially damaging our long-term prospects.

Certainly, I recognized my own behaviour within Duhigg's descriptions, but then I also realize I've done something about my bad habits that fits well with Duhigg's suggestions regarding making habits work for us rather than against us. For instance, five years ago I gave up drinking alcohol. No, I didn't have a drink problem (at least by UK middle-class standards). But I'd become concerned by the potentially corrosive impact on my brain of my habitual intake (my father had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's in this period).

So I decided to give up alcohol – switching from an alcohol habit to a coffee habit after reading that caffeine helps ward off Alzheimer's. Of course, I can report that my caffeine addiction's progressing nicely – triggered by various cues (smelling coffee, seeing others with a coffee, passing a favoured coffee chain) that trip me into the routine of buying (or making) coffee and the reward of enjoying the taste and feeling stimulated. I'd replaced a bad habit with a better (but not perfect) one – good for me.

Yet Duhigg would also be impressed by other positives centred around my caffeine habit. Writing books and running a company isn't easy. So I get to work at 6.45 a.m. in order to write until 9.30 a.m. Yet coffee is an important part of this routine. I couldn't start without it or even get out of bed without knowing that a coffee is the reward. That said, by mid-morning it's no longer caffeine I crave but exercise. I'm cued to go to the gym and use that routine to generate my ‘feel good’ reward.

In fact I use habits to get me through the day: coffee to get me started at 6.45 a.m.; another coffee to switch me over to company matters at 9.30 a.m.; exercise to deal with my mid-morning flag; lunch and a cup of tea to lever me towards an afternoon's productivity; and a sweet reward (naughty I know) to squeeze that last hour before my cycle home, which releases further endorphins for an hour or so playing with the kids.

While not all these habits are good, they're all geared towards one thing: productivity. I've replaced my unproductive habits (distraction, alcohol, anxiety) with productive ones (coffee, exercise, work) that bring me new rewards (endorphins, stimulation, progress towards my goals) – a resolution that groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) would fully endorse.

‘In order to offer alcoholics the same rewards they get at the bar,’ says Duhigg, ‘AA has built a system of meetings and companionship – the “sponsor” each member works with – that strives to offer as much catharsis as a Friday night bender. If someone needs relief, they can get it from talking to their sponsor or attending a group gathering, rather than toasting a drinking buddy.’

The aim is to keep the cue, and retain the reward, while inserting a new routine in the middle. And, if we apply this to our own unproductive habits, we can – with thought and effort – convert them into more productive ones that help reinforce Hill's need for persistence.

Self-addiction and its consequences

Bad habits may not be so easily eradicated, however – especially if we can't even recognize them for what they are. According to Noah Blumenthal, business coach and author of You're Addicted to You (2007) any repetitive action that doesn't enhance your life, but that you cannot stop doing – such as getting up too late or talking too much or bitching about others – could be what Blumenthal calls ‘self-addiction’. These are negative habits that disable us. They may be unconscious or, if conscious, we may dismiss them as part of our character. Yet we have developed these behavioural habits through our failure to tackle them, allowing them to become a self-addiction.

‘Behaviours that outlive their original purpose do so because at some point they become self-reinforcing’, says Blumenthal. ‘Many behaviours that start out healthy turn unhealthy over time’.

Yet Blumenthal is convinced we can change. To do so, he says, we need to deal with the problem in three parts.

In Part One we must begin by learning to identity our self-addictions. We can do this by, first, contrasting our behaviour with those around us. What actions and reactions do we not like about ourselves but cannot seem to stop? Negativity is one of my own, for instance – always looking for the downside and, inevitably, finding it.

Then we should allow this to shock us. As with my friend snapping and exploding a few of my self-built myths regarding my unhappy state and its causes – we should imagine being told off by a friend or associate who's finally had enough of our poor behaviour. Secretly, we knew it was coming: so let's do it to ourselves before they do it to us.

Blumenthal's Part One ends with a commitment to change. Having written down your self-addictions – using your diary – you should write down specific goals. But you also need to understand your motives for change. For instance, if I want to tackle my addiction to negativity, I should focus on my key motive for changing, which is the fact my negativity portrays me in a poor light with others. My goal of developing positivity, therefore, is aligned with my desire to radiate a more positive attitude publicly.

Building support

Part Two involves ‘building support’. In fact, this is as much about losing support as building it because we may have to identity the people that encourage our addictions or unhealthy behaviours and – literally – move away from them. These are the ‘co-conspirators’ – the ‘partners in crime’ we enrol as our allies when indulging our poor behaviour. Once our friends – legitimizing our behaviour – they're now the very people chaining us to the seabed of our self-addiction.

Yet ‘co-conspirators’ are not our only barriers in terms of people, according to Blumenthal. There's the ‘pessimist’ who thinks we cannot change, the ‘admirer’ who thinks we're great as we are (and may fear the changes taking place), and the ‘avoider’ who simply pretends there's nothing wrong.

Unfortunately, once identified, Blumenthal's pretty adamant: these relationships have got to go, to be replaced by supporters, who come in three main flavours.

• ‘Knowing partners’ – who you tell about the positive changes you're trying to make,
• ‘Informing partners’ – who offer feedback and monitor your progress,
• ‘Working partners’ – who are your new partners for change, working with you to help make the positive change.

As you may have spotted, this all sounds like the sponsors used by AA to keep the newly sober on track, which is exactly Blumenthal's ploy: to develop a ‘circle of support’ that helps reinforce the changes being made and to celebrate the successes.

Of course, we must also remember that many of our self-addictions are far from extreme. My negativity, for instance, is disabling but hardly life-threatening: I just tend to see threats more clearly than I see opportunities. If I've recruited a few pessimistic allies along the way, it seems a tad unfair to dump them – a move that may result in dramas I could do without. Far better to make them ‘knowing partners’ – telling them about my need for change and trying to enlist their support, while also looking to widen my network to include those that can aid my new outlook.

Finally, in Part Three, we have to take action. What does our new behaviour look and feel like in reality, and how do we reach that healthier spot? This may involve modelling our actions on others who've succeeded at our desired behaviour, and it should include keeping a record of our actions (in the usual place).