p. 175 | Habits | AdventAI

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 27, 1875

Habits.

Many people are much more governed by and under the influence of their habits than they are at all willing to confess. They start, in the very beginning, by doing nothing except when they “feel like it.” At any other time—that is, when they don’t possess the inclination—they let it alone.

Now, this giving up to or waiting for the inclination is only a bad habit, which, given up to, opens the way for many more. People who yield to it are without any exception, lazy, inefficient, good-for-nothing people. They never amount to much, and never accomplish anything; and the secret lies in their bad habits.

Many people have a habit—it is nothing more—of getting up in the morning as cross, and peevish, and sour, as though they had slept in a bath of vinegar. Nobody can speak to them without getting a snap or a snarl; everything goes wrong, and produces an explosion of ill-temper. This is a habit which soon spoils the peace of a whole household, and once fallen into, a good, strong will is needed to overcome it.

Now, the power of the will over our habits is much stronger than we sometimes think. A man can be the master of his habits, or he can yield to them until they will entirely master him. They only need to be studied more, only need to be better understood, to bring them under the dominion of our wills, and enable us to control them. A great deal is learned when we know what habits we possess, because then our reason will point out to us the way to deal intelligently with them.

A learned writer and wise man once being asked what was the true secret of success, gave the laconic answer, “Regular habits.”

And there is no good reason why this should not be true. Regular habits—regular work, regular eating, regular sleeping, temperance of mind and body, are indeed the elements of success in life.

No man or woman has a moral right to indulge in bad habits; for they injure not only ourselves, but others, and interfere greatly with the performance of the duties of every-day life.

We should watch our habits closely, and if we find we are forming bad ones, make a direct effort of the will, and get rid of them as speedily as possible.