First man maketh habits. Then his habits maketh the man.
A person is an accumulation of habits. Looking into someone’s habits gives insight into what the person is.
How a person sits today is how he sat yesterday too. His posture is built upon years and years of sitting. How a person walks, eats, talks, behaves on an average is how he has been doing this all the time.
It is tempting to use this insight to judge others, but this knowledge is best used for turning inwards. Self-introspection provides a lot of habits that need to be looked at and corrected.
“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing. A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days. It is a scaffolding on which a worker can stand and labor with both hands at sections of time. A schedule is a mock-up of reason and order—willed, faked, and so brought into being; it is a peace and a haven set into the wreck of time; it is a lifeboat on which you find yourself, decades later, still living.” – Annie Dillard from her book ‘A Writing Life’.
Habits are the systems of each person’s life. What a person plans for, he may achieve eventually; that is the destination. But habits are the journey. The journey can be stimulating or stressful, invigorating or enervating, depending upon the systems or the SOP – Standard Operating Procedures.
Habits are the systems by which we make our journey in life. Habits are the Standard Operating Procedures of our response to specific stimuli. Do I respect my alarm or do I snooze it? Do I keep the shopping cart back in place after use or I abandon it? Do I procrastinate? Do I help when someone needs help? Do I do what must be done, even when nobody is looking?
Do I know which of my habits are not good? Do you know which of yours need to be worked upon? Can we make the changes needed?
Yes, yes and YES!