How to choose wise habits

[thenunn]

I subscribe to Innerslef.com..this is from a recent article relating to habits good and bad and how to choose good ones ...

How Do We Form Habits? Creating the Habits We Desire

The formation of habits has been studied extensively by behavioral scientists and sports psychologists alike. Understanding how desirable habits are created and undesirable habits are replaced is invaluable, particularly in repetitive-motion sports such as golf or diving. In fact, you often see golfers practicing certain parts of their swings over and over again, or divers standing poolside, going through the motions of complex dives they are about to execute. They are practicing and habitualizing their particular moves.

What does that mean? To me, when we say that something is a habit, it means that it is the natural way we do something. We do it intuitively, without having to think about it. The martial arts student practices the moves over and over again, habitualizing responses until they become effortless, intuitive, and lightning fast.

There is no intellectual process that has to occur in a time of crisis where the brain is saying, “My opponent is doing this, so I must do that.” The responses just happen because they are a natural part of the student’s behavior. That is what we are after. We want something like being more aware of our thoughts to be just a natural behavior, not something that requires a lot of struggle.

Being Aware of What You Want to Achieve

Getting to this point is not complicated. It does take some effort, but the effort is minimal once we understand the process.

What is required is that you are aware of what you want to achieve, that you know the motions you must intentionally repeat to accomplish the goal, and that you execute your actions without emotions or judgments; just stay on course.

You should do this in the comfort of knowing that intentionally repeating something over a short course of time will create a new habit or replace an old one.

Reprinted with permission of the publisher,

New World Library, Novato, CA. ©2012 by Thomas M. Sterner.

newworldlibrary.com or 800-972-6657 ext. 52.