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Organizing
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Chapter 10 Strengthening Good Habits - Discarding Bad Ones "Habit is either the best of servants, or worst of masters." Nathaniel Emmons (American theologian) Since Harry Lorayne is neither a psychiatrist nor a psychologist he didn't think he should get into some areas of good and bad habits that he would have preferred to. He does have his own thoughts about habits that he wanted to share. Your life would flow along much smoother and easier if you have acquired good habits. "A man's fortune has its form given to it by his habits." Lorayne suggests, "If you can train your self to acquire good habits of health, recreation, prompt decision-making, learning and work, you will almost surely form the habit of success and happiness." Now bad habits, that is a different story! Horace Mann (an American education reformer ..plus)said, "Habit is a cable. We weave a thread of it every day, and at last we cannot break it." So if we are weaving habits it is a good idea to make it a good habit. So Lorayne asks if we would like to break that bad habit and we all do have some bad habit, some worse than others. One authority suggests deliberately repeating the habit over and over so that you consciously realize that you have that habit. It doesn't work for all habits but I guess it does for some. Not something I had heard of myself. One example being if you continuously hit the wrong key when typing, just deliberately hit that key. You finally consciously know that you should hit the right key. He mentions that stammering and nail biting and others can use this method but with that kind you should get help from a psychologist. Now of course there are many others in which that method would be detrimental to quiting, such as smoking! Other authorities say to stop, 'cold turkey' but that doesn't always work. He talks of hypnosis as what some suggest (something I am totally against) but says that it mostly is a temporary solution. He also feels that one bad habit that is removed by hypnosis maybe replaced by another bad habit. If that is the case then that is doubly bad. If the one was replaced temporarily and you acquired a second one, there you are with two habits to get rid of. Lorayne feels that the best way to get rid of a bad habit is to want to in the first place. I agree, such as a smoker, if a smoker doesn't want to quit he will either never quit or continuously quit and start again only twice as bad. From my experience, I have seen smokers only quit if the doctor tells them to either quit or die. Many have died rather than quit. Also many have died because they have waited too long to quit. Lorayne says that people like their bad habits and if they want to get rid of them they should work on wanting to give them up. He suggests one way would be to replace the bad habit with a good one. Bad habits are annoying to other people but we don't bother to find out if they are. He suggests you should think about all your bad habits and decide if they are offensive. Will you take a chance and ask your friends if your habit offends them? A quote from William James (psychologist and philosopher), "We all want our friends to tell us of our bad qualities; it is only the particular a** that does so, that we can't tolerate." Erasmus (Dutch Renaissance humanist) said, "A nail is driven out by another nail, habit is overcome by habit." One suggestion is to bet with yourself that you won't continue the habit. Get your close friends to keep you from digressing. You know, those ones who are willing to take your abuse to keep you from repeating the habit, your true friends. Lorayne suggests an idea used by the 24 Hour Club of Alcoholics Anonymous: they stay away from liquor one day at a time. They challenge themselves this way: "I won't drink today. I'm certainly man/woman enough to stay away from it just one day. Tomorrow I'll drink to my heart's content --but today I abstain." The next day they do the same. "If you think about giving something up forever, it can present a frightening picture. But looking at the sacrifice a day at a time makes it easier to bear." Giving in to the whispers of temptation, such as: "Why not?" or "Just this once" or "This will be the last time." will get you back to that nasty habit. Lorayne understands that something you have been doing possibly for years and years is not going to be easy. He really stresses the fact that, "you must really and truly want to quit!" The fact that it is hard he states will make the achievement so much more satisfying! Mark Twain (American author and humorist) said that, "A habit cannot be tossed out the window; it must be coaxed down the stairs a step at a time." Concentration is the key He says, some people can't do the same thing twice because of lack of concentration. "Learn to do things with 'attention' to how, where and what, and after a while they will become habits." Meaning you won't even have to think about the action anymore, it will be automatic. Once you have achieved that good habit you can start to concentrate on another one. Many successful people can run their businesses automatically because they have trained themselves to do the repetitive jobs habitually. Patricia Downing |
