Habit
“…a certain attitude…which seems to prevent self from fully expressing joy…”
Have you developed certain conditioned responses to given situations? As I examined my life I found that I was very uneasy in certain situations. When I happened to be with a person who somehow made me feel unworthy, I would compensate by turning to humor to help regain my balance. Often that humor was self-deprecating. Either way I would notice that my body would tense and I would need a short period of rebalancing following such events. Please understand that I went many years before I could characterize these episodes as such. It was just how I reacted. No big deal. But in fact it was and is a big deal. If there is a physical reaction there is an energetic reaction as well.I developed certain verbal responses to situations. Ask me if things were going well, my response would always jokingly be, “As well as I deserve.” Ask me if I had a good day, I’d jokingly reply, “It was day.” As I write this book my current response to everyone and every event is “God bless you.” Someone says “I hope all is well.” I respond “God bless you.” Someone says “I don’t think you should do that.” I respond “God bless you.” The sky is falling… “Well, God bless you.”
I believe that if you closely examine your life you will find that you have developed a series of situational responses that you pull out of your bag of reactions when the need calls. We pray when we see the need. We are defensive when threatened. We are outgoing when perfectly confident. We are introverted (or the opposite) when unsure. I tend to shift my body’s energies accordingly. They are free and unobstructed when I am balanced. They are sluggish or even totally blocked when I am fearful.
The trick, however, is that I have relied upon little behavioral responses, body positions, facial expressions, postures and even energy alterations. I have called them forth to meet each situation. The problem is that I have become so fluent with their language, so skilled in their implementation that I’ve accepted them as me. If you imply that I’m a loser, I’ll reply “God bless you”, and I’ll tense in my stomach region, obstruct the energy in my solar plexus region, silently ask myself if I really am a loser, and buy into that to some degree, at some level. I’ve replied courageously, “God bless you,” but I’ve died a little bit inside. That is a habit.
I thought that I was learning to cope when I developed these habitual responses. I thought that my stomach pain was random in relation to my responses. I thought that I was protecting my emotions and diffusing the energy associated with such situations. I was. But I did not recognize that merely coping with my reactions was doing nothing to prevent them. I hadn’t developed an awareness of this habit. I became so accepting of my discomfort that I was willing to accept my habitual reactions as the best way to get by. These habits became an anesthetic. When scared, take a one liner. When unsure, take three self-deprecating jokes and call me when the situation eases.
I was in a habit of survival. I was not dealing with my underlying problem…fear. We approach our fears and become fear survivors through developed habits. We must identify these habits and transform them into proactive tools, not reactionary responses.
I have the habit of comparing myself to others. Who doesn’t, right? But I did it to the extreme. I was never good enough, tall enough, fast enough, smart enough, anything enough. And you know what? There were and are always plenty of equally fearful folks out there whose adopted habit was to remind people such as me that we aren’t ever good enough. My habit had been so keenly and masterfully developed that I would first give a conditioned response such as “You really think so?” Then I’d really think so. The truth was that “they” had developed a habit of projecting their fear (in the form of judgment) onto me and I’d developed a habit of internalizing the projections of others.
Do you remember your favorite teacher in school? Do you remember your least favorite? My least favorite teachers did not nurture my confidence. They seemed to love finding areas of my work that called for correction and hammering me with my failure. It seemed to me that no matter what I did they saw it as inferior to the work of those to whom I compared myself. I felt no love or respect from these teachers. There were other teachers, however, who somehow let me know that everything would be okay. They seemed to accept my shortcomings as a promise unfulfilled rather than a failure confirmed. They might even drive me to the point of exhaustion but they would always lovingly inspire me with their confidence that I would eventually be and do more than I could conceive.
In the school of your life, which teachers dominate your day? What patterns have you embraced? Your habits are your teachers. God has a way of presenting situations that awaken us to our less than productive patterns. I never really was big, fast or strong enough to be much of an athlete. Yet, I was driven to play. I loved all sports. I loved the brotherhood of friendly competition. The problem was there was always someone bigger, stronger, faster. So I developed a habit of survival. When things were going well and people were patting me on the back, telling me that I had just thrown a great pass, I'd acknowledge that and thank them, but I'd internalize the joy of accomplishment and suppress it with the underlying knowledge that someone else probably could have done it better. So I'd walk along the sideline exhibiting a humble confidence but really feeling my world of insecurities welling up inside. That became my habit. Every success wasn't real until the scoreboard changed and I internalized my joy and turned it into a fear of the future. I fooled them this time. What if they find out I'm really not good enough?
Events such as these were my teachers. But they were demanding task masters who did not forgive. Because of the emotional pain that I felt, I created habits that allowed me to avoid fully examining my relationship with these events, these teachers. Instead of examining the doubt, guilt and fear that I was feeling when events did not reinforce my worthiness, I built habits of survival that became my everyday responses, my friends. I should have looked at those events and those habit teachers with compassion. I know better now and I forgive them as I hope others forgive me. But the important aspects to be examined here are the habits of survival to which you and I still cling.
Ultimately those who projected their fear onto me were givers of gifts. If I had not had self-doubt and fear, I would have found their projections foreign and they would have had no impact upon me. Yet I did resonate with the fear of others. I did find familiarity in their projections. The reflection of their unworthiness became the mirror of my insecurities. Had I been a balanced receiver, I would have reflected love to them and we would have embraced each other in renewal. But my habit was to appear strong, calm, unmoved, maybe even defiant, all the while accepting my own degradation. These reminders were gifts unopened.
When I began to break my habit of reaction and stood up to these projections, I was able to begin to heal. Don't get me wrong, this was terribly, terribly hard at first. The nature of habit is that if you leave a habit behind, initially you are unsettled, you are unsure, somewhat akin to moving to a new neighborhood. Where will I find help when I need it? So if you tell me I'm probably not good enough and I can't reply "God bless you" and then internalize my fear that you might be correct, what can I do? How about replying, "God bless you" and sending a prayer of love and light that they too might find themselves worthy and no longer seek to add company to their misery? How about replacing a less-that-joyful habit with a joyful habit? Or better yet, know that we are all One in God's kingdom and that no habits are really needed. Just to love my neighbor as myself and myself as my neighbor. First however, I must love myself as God's child with all of the forgiveness and sense of worth that I truly deserve. This love then rises to the level of its intended meaning.
Our habits are our teachers. They provide a structural safety net until we can face the underlying causes of our sense of need. Habits serve as deflectors. They buy us a little time to regain our balance. We must be cautious, however, that they do not become a way of life. The child of an alcoholic develops habits of survival and protection. That child must someday realize that those early friends, those habits, may become later limitations. Habits are initially friends and teachers. As time passes, however, they may become ruts, comfort zones of self-denial, helping to maintain a facade of well-being which is actually a makeshift means of survival. Unproductive habits manifest as periods of ease followed by predictable periods of dis-ease.
We can learn from these teachers however. If we honestly examine our habits, we can embrace those which are born of love, and transform those which are given life through our fear. Ask, "Why did I feel that way?" Ask, "Why did I react that way?" "Why do I always meet this challenge with this habit?" "How does this habit heal me?" "How does this pattern benefit me?" "How does this habit facilitate my return to Oneness with God?" Answer honestly and with forgiveness to all, particularly yourself. Then balance with each fear through prayer and meditation and be the unobstructed, free-flowing child of God that you are meant to be.
As a high school teacher, I once taught a student whom I’ll refer to as Kari. She was frequently unable to attend class because her stomach would have “flare ups.” She was very bright, yet I could sense that she just did not fit the mold of the average high school student. From my perspective she was somewhat out of place, in an environment which was foreign to her deepest instincts. I’m sure that school, and its one-size-fits- all tendency, had always been this way for her.
Kari was a young lady whose light shone brightly, though she seemed unaware. Across the room sat another brilliant young lady, whom I’ll refer to as Mary. Mary was similar in her isolation in that she too had outgrown her surroundings. However, Mary seemed balanced and confident in whom she was growing to be. She seemed to understand that the greater comforts lay ahead as she labored in the unsettled environment of high school.
Still, it was not the landscape which was the key. Kari was in conflict with herself. Mary was not. How? Why? I confess that I do not know the intimate details of their lives and motivations; but, from an observational view, it was clear that Mary did not doubt her worthiness. I believe that Kari did. Worthiness in what respect? Who knows? More to the point, how on Earth is a 16- year-old unworthy of anything? Which of us would cast that stone? So while I and many others clearly recognized both young ladies to be brilliant children of God, their own recognition of that could not have been more different.
Mary was confident that her best effort was sufficient and that the outcome would bring joyful fruit. She met each challenge with calm fascination and resolve. She accepted the shortcomings of others.
You could feel resignation and sadness in Kari’s efforts. Kari’s step stones were met with fear as she sought to undo the seeming confirmation of her weakness. She seemed to hold those inside her, connecting and making them her own.
As my year with them wore on, I watched as their reactions manifested with predictable regularity. Their habits were seemingly ingrained. To others in our class, the two girls were their habits. Their habits of response were all that we had seen. Experientially, our habits are who we believe ourselves to be from moment to moment, day to day. Habits are addictive in the sense that they hold us within their grasp as we repetitively set reactive patterns in motion. Habits have no life of their own but they take on such as we supply them with our energy.
In the past, I engaged in many less-than-balanced habits which led to my repetitive digestive difficulties. Just as Kari and Mary, I became the momentary personification of my habits. How did I break that cycle to return to greater health? I brought myself into greater balance, day by day, by consciously connecting through a dialogue of prayer and meditation. I spoke and sought through prayer and I received through meditation. From that connection I examined who I had become and I removed the obstructions, the habits, which were redirecting the flow of my body’s energy. Prayer and meditation brought healing and peace. Then I created new patterns which were joyful and balanced. Fearful habits were replaced with clear and unobstructed patterns. When challenges appeared, I was able to meet them with calm recognition that they were merely teachers. These reminders became practice sessions in my quest to recall my true self. In so doing, I began to manifest the potential which we all possess to be free, at peace, and at ease in a state of joy and balance in all things.