This reference point phenomenon is, to me, the kind of thing that seems obvious after you've already done it, but isn't actually helpful if you're trying to change a behavior.

If you're trying to get into the habit of going to the gym or whatever, you already know that it's going to be to your benefit in "far" mode but "near" mode you just doesn't want to go. Near mode you has better stuff to do right now, healthfulness is far mode's problem. You can't re-program yourself to associate "working out" with "feeling good" until you've already been doing it for a while. This has been my experience, anyway. I run every day, and it's just part of what I do, but the catalyst to getting into this habit wasn't that I was suddenly able to convince myself that this was something that was good for me and that later on I'd enjoy it, even if I didn't enjoy it now -- no, the reason I started running was because at the time I had an immediate desire to do it (stress, pent-up frustration with life situations). I have absolutely no ability to trick my near mode to do things to the benefit of far mode; it has to have utility to me, right now.

Of course, now that I've been doing this for a while, when I'm about to go run I don't even have a mental dialog where I have to convince myself that it's something that I want to do - I just do it. If I haven't run today, then obviously I am going to run, there's modus ponens. If for some reason I have a voice saying I don't want to do it, my brain immediately overrides that with, "But that just doesn't make sense!". If I were trying to convey this mental process to someone else, I might say something like, "well, I just envision myself running and having a good experience, and then not running and not having that good experience, so I've changed my reference point". This after-the-fact explanation sort of explains what's happening in my mind, but doesn't actually give somebody else tools that allow them to actually copy it. The only advice I'd give is to find an actual compelling reason to do it whatever it is right now, rather than trying to fake yourself into thinking you want to do something that you really don't.

Basically, you're right about the changing reference points but I think you've got the order mixed up. That happens after you've changed the behavior.