What are some things that you make a conscious effort to do? Things that, if you weren’t actively thinking about, would most likely not happen. Also, how have these things backfired on you? Here are three of mine.
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[li]Avoid the ue of non-fluencies[/li]Things such as “like”, “uh”, “um”, “hm”, etc. These things always sound somewhat unintelligent and disorganized when I hear others use them, so I make a conscious effort on my part not to use them. Unfortunately, though, sometimes I talk faster than I think and I need to wait a moment to for my thoughts to catch up. Since I’m committed to avoiding the use of non-fluencies, this results in an abrupt pause in my speech. I’m not altogether sure this is any better than a drawn out “umm…”.
[li]Ask people questions[/li]Rather than talk about myself, I make a conscious effort to ask people questions to get them talking about themselves. The drawback of this, though, is that sometimes I just don’t give a shit. It can also be hard (for me) to keep this up for too long.
[li]Look at a girl’s face - not her rack[/li]This one is self explanatory. Talk about a challenge.
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Clean up after myself! I apparently was born without the “Betty Crocker Gene” ™, and housework does not come naturally to me. Therefore, I make a conscious effort to clean up messes when I see them. Otherwise, the squalor would overrun us!
Also, be a good mother. I feel I’ve succeeded (and continue to succeed) at this; but my mother was a psycho-bitch, and my father, while a good man, was an alcoholic, who drank alcoholically until I was 14, thereby being mostly unavailable to me during my formative years. He was also too drunk to do anything about my mother being a psycho-bitch. When I discovered, at age 24, I was pregnant (unplanned), the very first thing I decided was that I wanted to bear and keep the baby. The second thing I decided was that I wanted to be a good mother, and set about figuring out just how to do that. Have I been a perfect mother? Hells, no! Have I made mistakes? Yep. Thousands of them, at least. But I’ve made a conscious effort, over the past 22 years, to be a good mother. My oldest is now 22, my second daughter is 18, my third daughter is 9, so I am still actively “mothering” her. I think I do OK.
Interact with strangers. I’m very shy, but have had to train myself to act like I’m outgoing- in order to succeed in life and business, you need to be able to talk to people you don’t know. I don’t like it, I’m never comfortable with it, but I’ve become pretty good at faking it. So good that people can’t believe it when I tell them that I’m actually very shy.
When possible I buy stuff using coupons or when there is a sale; I imagine I save thousands each year by my shopping habits, and am always blown away how few of my friends ever seem to care about the price of anything. (of course I realise that its thier money and they are free to spend it anyway they please)
Last night I went out for a few beers, and the bar had a special on a brand I dont usually drink, but it was half the cost of the other brews----I ended up saving ten bucks or so, and also realised that I have no problem at all with the taste of cold draught Coors…
Challenge my own beliefs and preconceptions.
Check blind spots when reversing and changing lanes. There is no downside to doing this but I often have to remind myself to.
I try to appreciate that I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. I never want to take that for granted.
Deal with things that I am passionate about with logic instead of emotions.
Deal with racial issues I have with white people (making great strides with this one, thanks to a couple of things, including counsel from a very wise and good friend…he is dragging me kicking and screaming, and also due to the dope/giraffe/domebo/mellophant boards).
About the ‘um, uh’ thing. I think it is time for people to stop using this as a sign that one is inarticulate. Along with ‘profanities are a mark of low vocabulary’ we need to put this one to bed.
It is just a natural thing that humans that speak do (oddly enough, I don’t do it, that I have noticed). It is not a marker that the speaker is unintelligent. Some of our greatest orators do it all the time.
Improve my memory. Imho, one of the biggest reasons people have a bad memory is because they believe they have a bad memory.
That, and visiting the Straight Dope daily, too.
Tell people the nice things about them that cross my mind, but–without conscious effort–I rarely say out loud.
A good compliment has made my day before. So if I’m thinking something nice about someone, I try to let them know. Even if it’s a random stranger in front of me at the grocery store, she should know that I love her shoes. 
That is mine too. I live 1,800 miles from where I grew up but I recently joined Facebook and a few other networking sites and got hooked with a whole lot of people that I grew up with or knew many years before in college or for work. I try to give everyone a compliment when I first correspond with them again but I always worry about sounding creepy especially for the females. It could be anything but it is always sincere or I wouldn’t write them back in the first place. I have woken up in a dead sweat wondering if I wrote something strange in the least and gone over my e-mails. It is always perfectly fine. Everyone enjoys a sincere compliment and people seem to respond to it. I have to work on being less reserved in person now too.
I have to consciously remind myself every day that I have an obligation to my husband to stay alive.
I have to do this, too. I got really good at it in the early part of my life, so much so that people thought I was an extrovert. You have to keep it up, though. I never see anyone these days, and now I hide upstairs even when the phone rings.
Modulate my voice. I tend towards loudness, which I dislike and I know I have a terrible speaking voice. (I wonder if I might have benefited from elocution?) I also tend to be a chatterbox. Not a great combination, so I try to talk less and to talk more quietly.
Absolutely serious question, no snark intended. Are you getting help? Because this sounds serious. 
I try not to curse. First off, I don’t like it. Second, I’m too old to talk like that. Third, I find that it affects how I act in general. Of course, my teenager has to remind me that it’s a bathroom, not a potty.
I also try to focus on others and not on myself, but hobscrk777 pretty much mentioned that one inthe OP.
Stifle my internal critic. I realized a while back that I was spending most of the day belittling myself and replaying episodes of minor embarrassment in my head. Consciously telling that voice to shut up has improved my self esteem.
I am the complete opposite. I deal with everything with logic. Except Twilight which is crap.
Not interrupt people. I come from a family that interrupts each other constantly. When we sit down at dinner it can be a shouting match. I hate it, and yet I find myself doing it too.
I’m trying to stop doing it, and when out with friends I make a conscience effort to bite my tongue and wait for a break in conversation. I don’t think there’s a real downside to this, though I’m still working on it.
Perhaps the only redeeming quality of Twilight is that it is equally crappy on both and intellectual and emotional level!