You Can Learn To Change If You Practice It

Change doesn’t send a calendar invite. It shows up on an ordinary Tuesday, right when the schedule is already full. We dig into the gap between knowing and doing, and why the real lever for sustainable health isn’t more information, it’s better systems tied to a personal why. 

Drawing on decades in lifestyle medicine and a fresh read of Who Moved My Cheese?, we unpack the simple, profound truth that anticipation beats reaction when life shifts under our feet.

We share how behavior change models converge on a common thread: people act when goals feel personal, emotional, and immediate. You’ll hear a story about reframing a cold statistic into a living dream, the RV trip a patient and her husband saved for, that turned risk into motivation without shame. 

Along the way, we surface tools that actually fit real life: shrinking steps to spark momentum, linking habits to reliable cues, setting up environments that remove friction, and tracking small wins so confidence compounds. Perfection isn’t the prize; better odds are. Nutrition, movement, sleep, and stress management remain the pillars because they quietly tilt probabilities in your favor.

We also confront the system-level barriers: limited clinic time, communities without safe places to move, and messaging that leans on fear instead of meaning. The fix lives at every level. Individually, we can journal, practice projection, and design routines that flex under stress. As neighbors and professionals, we can advocate for bike paths, walkable streets, and policies that make the healthy choice the default. The through line is simple: prepare for change before it arrives, and you’ll suffer less when it does.

Ready to turn knowledge into action you can sustain? Press play, take one small step today, and tell us the one habit you’ll start this week. 

If this conversation helps, follow, share with a friend who needs momentum, and leave a review so others can find it.

Go check out my website for tons of free resources on how to transition towards a healthier diet and lifestyle.

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Thanks so much!

Peace, love, plants!
Dr. Jules 

Transcript

Section A

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Yo plant based buddies, welcome back to Season 3 of the podcast. This is gonna be amazing. We'll be talking about all of the different pillars of lifestyle medicine from nutrition to exercise to stress to sleep and everything in between. Yo, plant-based buddies, welcome back to another episode. Today I want to talk about behavior change. Now, you could have all of the knowledge of the world and have listened to all of the over a hundred podcast episodes that I've published, but still knowing, having the information, knowing what to do is much different than actually finding the time, motivation, energy to actually change. Now, over the last 20 years, I've been teaching behavior change science to interns and applying these principles that I've learned to my own life. Now, much in the same way as you can teach behavior change to an intern, you can actually learn to apply its principles to your own life. And I admit that I've enjoyed reading the science, but I've enjoyed applying it to my daily routine over the last 20 years to learn how to play a piano and learn how to perfect my solo skills on guitar and to get the motivation to work out almost every single day of the year for the almost 20-some years that I've really started training hard. I've competed the World Ninja Championships three straight years with my wife, competed in Ninja Warrior competitions for almost six years in my 30s and 40s, and have just applied all of its principles to pretty much everything I do. Now, it's very complex behavior change. I cannot review how someone, an individual, applies that all of that knowledge to his life in 20 minutes. Obviously, it would take hours and hours, and I'm not sure that's really what people want. But I I recently read a book called Who Moved My Cheese. It's almost like a children's book, but it really helped summarize behavior change in a book that you can read in less than 60 minutes. Now it's actually my colleague that suggested I read this book and that I recommend making it read to my children. So this book is called Who Moved My Cheese? It's written by Dr. Spencer Johnson, kind of funny title for a guy like me that doesn't consume dairy. But Dr. Johnson passed away in 2017, but he left behind a legacy that will outlive him. He sold close to 30 million copies worldwide, so I assume that this book is a good one and it was probably worth reading. But yet, even with many good intentions, it literally sat on my night table more than two years. I didn't feel guilty about it. Knowing the principles of behavior change, I knew that it was just not my time to read that book. Staring me in the face, I thought about it regularly. But finally, I got a chance to read it recently. When I finally picked it up, I read it in less than an hour, and that surprised me not because it was shallow, but because it was simple, almost deceptively simple. So it felt a little bit like a children's book. It was light, it was playful. You could almost picture the cartoon unfolding in your mind. But yet, underneath that simplicity, there was some very well-grounded and uncomfortable truths about behavior change. Now, behavior change can apply to any change you're thinking about, whether it's trying to be more active or trying to eat differently or lose weight. There are many different behavior change theories from the transtheoretical model of change to the social cognitive theory to the health belief model. All of them converge towards the same common themes. Basically, we need to find our own why. We need to find a reason or the reason or reasons that we connect personally, cognitively, emotionally, to why we want to change. For some people, it'll be because they want to feel good again. And for some people, it'll be to see their kids grow up. But over the years I've seen reasons that I would have never guessed. And so everyone has their own personal belief system, their own personal goals, and different reasons to change or not to change. It's not just a matter of lacking willpower. Some people can excel in a certain domain of their life, but still have trouble stopping smoking. And some people can stop smoking but not do something as simple as stop biting their nails. Behavior change is complex. But this book really basically just simplified it. Now, even with this weird title of Who Moved My Cheese, this book isn't about cheese. It's about how humans respond when what feels familiar suddenly disappears. And in this story, Dr. Johnson he presents the signs of change in a way that almost anyone could understand. No medical jargon, no heavy theory, just a few funny characters and behaviors and consequences. Now, some people resist change, they cling to whatever used to work, even if proof piles up that it's no longer useful for them. Other people, they adapt super quickly, they notice change, they get data, they expect it, they prepare for change. And the central message of the book is simple: change is inevitable, will happen whether you like it or not. But the suffering really doesn't come from the change itself, but often from how unprepared we are when change arrives. What struck me the most about the book is how accurately the characters mirror patience that I see in real life and even certain aspects of my own personality. And I suspect that most people who will read this book will recognize themselves in at least one of these characters, probably more than one, depending on where you are, what phase of life you're in. Life will always throw curveballs, and these curveballs can look like relationship breakups, financial stressors, uncertainties in your career, an unexpected loss, or deceased, or realizing that your behaviors are not aligned with your values. Now, in my line of work, most curveballs are usually always health-related. They almost never arrive at a good time. Now, I'll be very, very honest here. I am very afraid coming sick. I've been there, I've felt my body fail me in a way that felt sudden and out of my control and at the worst possible time possible. That experience propelled me into the life I live now. And in many ways, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. And still, even with all of all my knowledge and behavior change, with everything I know, even with all of the habits that I have built, that fear never fully disappears, that a curveball will happen. And I guessing that a lot of people here have been through these types of phases in their lives and they've grown stronger because of them. Now, every single day at work, I sit with people that are receiving life-changing diagnoses, often on a normal Monday or an ordinary Tuesday, and often when they least expect it. And often when they're already overwhelmed by life. And I know at some point, illness may come my way again. My goal has never been perfection, and it's certainly not being 100% certain that I won't become sick in the past. My goal is simply that if it happens, I just don't want it to be my own fault. And not because I was ignoring the science and what it has been telling me for decades. Now that's why I prioritize lifestyle behaviors that are rooted in solid, peer-reviewed science, not extreme, not perfection or fears or trends. This mindset has shaped how I live my life and how I practice medicine. It's the foundation of everything I try to share here. Try to be nuanced, I try to not make promises or guarantees, but just try to guide you in a way you live with better odds. Just better statistical probabilities that you'll have good outcomes instead of bad ones. And over 20 years of medical practice, I've personally faced more curveballs than I could count. And being ill and getting diagnosed, there's no good time, and life is not going to wait until things are stable. Adaptation is not optional. It is really essential to plan and prepare in advance for change that is coming. That's why this book really came at the perfect time for me. I had just spent months studying and preparing for my board certification lifestyle medicine exams. I completed them the beginning of December. And then recognizing how much my family has sacrificed for me, I recommended that we maybe take a family vacation. Everyone jumped on board very quickly. And all of a sudden, we are flying through a med to a medical conference in Florida. As we're on the plane, I decide that I'm gonna read this book. I want to start January fresh, like everyone. It's a new year, I have new goals, I want to put new systems in place. And so this book that has been standing on my night table for years is just hits me at the perfect time. So I'm sitting on the plane, I tune out Block Off the World and lock down and lock in to this book. And it just reminded me that learning how to respond to change is one of the most valuable skills that we can develop, not only as a doctor, but as a human. Capacity to adapt to change, to anticipate it and prepare for it, and to put systems in place so it doesn't blindside us completely. Now that's true for your career, your relationship, and especially for health. So Who Moves My Cheese is a simple book with a profound message about change. It reminds us that resistance often creates more suffering than the change itself. And that anticipating change, preparing for it, and building flexible systems that can make life's curveballs easier to navigate. Now, health adaptation is not something to put on the back burner. You should be reflecting regularly on why, when, and where you resist change, especially when there's proof in your environment that maybe it's time to change. You should be focusing on building systems that support health before a crisis arrives. That includes eating a healthy diet and moving your body and having good sleep and managing your stress. Y'all know that these pillars of health count exponentially more than everything else that people are trying to sell you online. And honestly, in my line of work, I would never say I told you so to a patient. But when a patient comes with a diagnosis of high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes or a heart attack or a stroke, I'm rarely surprised. And I always thought, should I have done more earlier for this patient? But I'll be honest, most patients don't want to change, or they the system is simply not built in a way to help them navigate change. And for me, who has a super limited time with my patients, because I have months of patient caseloads waiting, it's just very frustrating trying to navigate the healthcare system. When there's misalignment between values and between behaviors, that creates this cognitive friction and dissonance. And for me, I know that when I'm crushed or an hour late and I have emergencies that I didn't predict were going to happen that day, and I'm I see a patient that needs change counseling, and I'm just not equipped with time that day to do it, it creates frustration. So, but I want to empower my patients to do that while they're not sitting in my office to build these systems that could support change. Now, for those who follow me on social media, I always kind of push back against fear-based thinking. I want people to focus on being prepared instead of being perfect, and I want them to revisit simple lessons periodically. Sometimes super complex psychological behaviors are hiding behind very simple psychological concepts. Try to live a life that's aligned with your values. Try to surround yourself with people who challenge your way of thinking with wisdom and compassion. And remember that adapting early to change is almost always less painful than adapting too late. Change will come. Learning how to respond to it may be one of the most important skills that you'll ever develop. Now, I spend my days trying to politely push patients towards healthier behaviors, trying to help them understand why they're resisting change, while also being transparent and honest about the urgency that their cholesterol is at, or the blood pressure, or their blood sugar, or their weight, or their mental health. The unfortunate thing is something like 70 to 80% of visits in primary care are for medical conditions directly related to lifestyle choices that we make every single day. There needs to be change on multiple levels, from the patient to the community to the system and policies that guide everything. So I think at all levels, we must be involved and advocate for better environments that nudge us towards healthy behaviors, communities that build walking trails and bike paths, and individuals that learn the simple concepts behind behavior changes. Connecting with your why is probably the foundation of that, meaning finding reasons that you connect with emotionally, personally, cognitively, and deeply that will fuel that behavior change journey for you. Now let me tell you a final story about a patient who wanted to try to stop smoking. She wasn't able to stop smoking even with the best medication and the patches and the inhalers and the gums and the pills. But at some point, I said, I used a very simple psychological interviewing technique called projection. I asked her to see herself in 10 years. So where did she see herself? What did she see herself doing? And she responded with, well, you know, me and my husband for the past decades, we've been taking small amounts of money from our pay, putting it in a saving account because we want to buy an RV and tour the country. So when we calculated her Framingham risk score, that's a risk calculator that predicts according to your cholesterol, according to your blood pressure, your glucose, your health parameters, it gives us a percentage that estimates your risk of suffering from cardiovascular disease in the next 10 years. Now, when I tell patients that they have a 22% risk of having a heart attack or a stroke in the next decade, that's really tough to hold in your hands, right? I often used to use these statistics to try to motivate my patients through fear, to I wanted to scare them and saying, oh, this is a one out of five chance that you will have a heart attack or stroke if you don't lower these parameters and get yourself in a safer range. And some people were scared, and some people were scared into changing. But what I really noticed is that most people weren't. They were coming back with parameters out of normal range in three to six months, and it seemed like my messaging didn't work. So when I used projection, and instead of saying you're gonna have a one out of five chance of having a heart attack or stroke in 10 years, and I said, You're gonna have a one out of five chance of not going on that RV trip because you may have a stroke or heart attack that prevents you from enjoying it, that hit a different note. Now, all of a sudden, that patient was reflecting on their weekend date nights where they mapped out what they wanted to visit and calculated how much time and gas it would cost. They were really thinking about all of the sacrifices, like sacrificing parts of their pay, every single paycheck to put towards this trip. They were really connecting with that 22% of elevated risk or of probability of having a stroke or a heart attack. Now it wasn't about strokes or heart attacks, it was about not being able to fulfill a lifelong dream. Now, for that patient, it was the RV trip with her husband, and for other patients, it's seeing their grandchildren grow up or walk their daughters down the aisle. Some people call that an aha moment, but for some people it's a series of mini aha moments. No, I love this quote. It goes, luck is opportunity meeting preparedness. And luck happens, or aha moments happen to people who were looking for them. And looking for them is a skill that you can develop. Whether it's gratitude, journaling, or simply putting aside time to reflect on these things, behavior change and connecting with your why, all these reasons are things that you can develop. Being prepared to receive an aha moment is something you can learn. And I know that these teachings, whether from the books that I Just read or books that I read 20 years ago. Behavior change is a well-mapped out science, and you can learn. And hopefully, I can help teach you. And if you've listened to all of these first hundred some episodes that I've published, hopefully have helped you better understand the science of behavior change. I always say small incremental changes add up over time. Start low, go slow. Put yourself in a position to have small wins. These build confidence. Confidence builds momentum. And when you have small wins, you can reflect on why they happened and use these tools for future puzzles in your life. There are some caveats and catches to that, but I largely agree. But you can learn a change. I encourage people reading books like Atomic Habits or Who Moved My Cheese? There are hundreds of other self-help books that teach these same concepts. You can even go back to season one on an episode calling Finding Your Why, which I basically review this type of topic, this type of content about behavior change. Right on. I hope this makes sense. I hope I've helped navigate the signs of behavior change in a way that you can understand. Change can be learned. It is a skill that you build and develop. Hopefully, this has helped inspire you to start your change journey. Cool. Right on. Thanks so much for listening. Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you in the next episode. Peace. Hey everyone, go check out my website, plantbased drjoul.com, to find free downloadable resources. And remember that you can find me on Facebook and Instagram at Dr.JulesCormier and on YouTube at Plantbased Dr. Jewels.