Habits.

I heard an interesting little tidbit on the radio station I listen to the other day about habits – about how hard it is to get back into a habit after a period of inactivity.

Of course, I immediately started thinking about some of my habits, and how difficult it was to make them a part of my routine.

Flossing, for one.  

My Granny has worked for close to 3 decades for a pediatric dentist office.  She saw kids come into their office with mouths full of cavities.  She swore her grandchildren would not be like that.  And so she taught us the basic habits of dental hygiene, and it worked.  I went to the same dentist office that she works at until I got married, and I’m proud to report that I have never had a cavity.

Of course, we were without dental insurance until I started working full-time last year, and I decided I should probably find a dentist office that didn’t have murals of jungle scenes painted on the walls.

I walk in full of confidence that despite the fact that I hadn’t been to a dentist in a couple of years, my teeth would be in tip-top shape.

WRONG.

Sure, my teeth looked great, no cavities…but I had been skipping a pretty crucial step in my dental hygiene.  Flossing.

I had developed the beginnings of periodontal disease.  They even gave me a pamphlet to go into more detail…YIKES!

I had to sit at the dentist’s office, mouth wide open and completely numb for TWO hours while a hygienist scraped my gums.  Not fun.  

All because I didn’t take a few minutes every day to floss.

You better believe almost every single night, I take time to floss (and rinse with Listerine).  It took me having to go through that horrible procedure (and even worse – sore gums for days afterwards) to get it through my head that flossing is important.

And that’s how it feels with other habits that are important to me – church, time studying the Word, time one-on-one with my husband – I have to work at making them a part of my life.  

Are they essential to my well-being and happiness?  Absolutely.

Do I sometimes have to hit rock bottom to realize how important they are to me?  You betcha. 

But that’s the thing…I am completely and utterly committed to making time for these things – I will move things around, re-schedule, stay up later than normal, get up earlier in the morning - you name it, I will do it.

That’s how important they are to me.

So, I challenge you – write down a list of those habits that you are having a hard time “fitting in” to your schedule.  Identify open or unused time during your day when you can fit in some time with your hubby or time when you can sit down and read a devotional.  

You will notice a change – trust me.

Do it now.  Don’t wait until you are full of Novocain and unable to speak for half a day…because, well, that’s just not fun for anyone involved.  

Here’s my list of hopeful habits – habits I’m hoping to merge into my schedule permanently:

1. Blogging
2. Bi-weekly date nights
3. Monthly volunteer/service projects
4. Weekly women’s fellowship/mentoring sessions – anyone, help?

But be sure you live out the message and do not merely listen to it and so deceive yourselves. For if someone merely listens to the message and does not live it out, he is like someone who gazes at his own face in a mirror. For he gazes at himself and then goes out and immediately forgets what sort of person he was. But the one who peers into the perfect law of liberty and fixes his attention there, and does not become a forgetful listener but one who lives it out—he will be blessed in what he does.

James 1:22-25