My youngest grandson, Bryson, and I, have an acquired habit that has become almost involuntary! He thought it necessary for us to have a \u201cdap\u201d handshake. Oh, you want to know what a \u201cdap\u201d handshake is? Dap is a friendly gesture between two people. Giving dap typically involves handshaking, fist bumping, thumbs interlocking and finger snapping. That MIGHT be OUR dap and every time we see each other or leave each other\u2026..we DAP (and I sneak a hug in there when I can)! It\u2019s become a habit I love!
I have a habit of waking up every morning around 4 a.m. I can\u2019t help myself. It\u2019s a habit. I have many more habits. Some I\u2019m proud of and others that I need to overcome! I enjoy playing pickleball with a great group of friends. We get into the game so much that if we make a lousy shot, we\u2019ll hear an occasional cuss word. They laugh at me when I say \u201cOh, dear!” “Mercy me!\u201d That\u2019s my habit.
I\u2019m sure you have habits too. What habits do you have that might affect how others see you? Biting your fingernails (Oh, how well I remember that awful one when I was a kid)? Running your fingers through your hair? Interrupting conversations so you can speak? (Yikes! That\u2019s a bad habit I need to break!) Being a constant complainer? Saying \u201cLike\u201d all the time \u2013 \u201cI was like so happy; I like ran to the store\u201d. Talking with your mouth filled with food? Nervously tapping your fingers?
HABITS are almost like being on “Auto Pilot”. Once we hit “auto pilot” \u2013 we move through life without considering how our habits might affect our lives and how others see us. Those are our involuntary habits.
There are many \u201cgood to great\u201d HABITS that were formed in our lives that consistently, and repetitiously, make us BETTER people. For example, remember teaching your children to “Watch both ways before you cross the street”? Think about how we were taught to look both ways before crossing the street. It served us well to this day. And it will for our children, forever, too!
There are many positive habits that bring out the best in us AND our children. Through our examples, we encourage them to say: “Thank you!” and “Yes, Ma’am or Yes, Sir”. Speaking \u201cI love you\u201d; \u201cI appreciate you!\u201d; \u201cWay to go!\u201d Those are involuntary habits \u2013 that we \u201chabitually\u201d use ourselves and we drive them home to our children that they are so proud of our apprentices. They have good manners. They are kind to others. They are generous and they express gratitude consistently.
And for those of us who are radical believers in the favors and special blessings that come directly from God……we naturally and habitually say, “Praise the Lord.” “Thanks be to God.” \u201cGod is so good!\u201d We might be in the middle of some \u201clife\u201d storms and are facing major challenges and circumstances that seem out of control, but we habitually declare: “Praise the Lord! You\u2019re working all this out for my good. This is no surprise to You! I thank you, God, IN all these things!”
Great, involuntary habits that serve us well in good times and tough times. Forming good habits takes time, patience, and self-discipline. But a life filled with positive habits has the power to create real, positive change in ourselves and in those who want to be their best selves, too!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My youngest grandson, Bryson, and I, have an acquired habit that has become almost involuntary! He thought it necessary for us to have a \u201cdap\u201d handshake. Oh, you want to know what a \u201cdap\u201d handshake is? Dap is a friendly gesture between two people. Giving dap typically involves handshaking, fist bumping, thumbs interlocking and finger…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15779,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[23215,23216,23214],"tags":[23205,5753,3504,3505,1210,1769,23210,23208,23209,3507,230,40,23206,4160,23211,8253,23213,8685,23212],"class_list":["post-15777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bad-habits","category-dap-handshake","category-habits","tag-acquired-habit","tag-auto-pilot","tag-bad-habits","tag-biting-fingernails","tag-blog","tag-christian","tag-cussing","tag-dap","tag-dap-handshake","tag-good-habits","tag-habits","tag-inspiration","tag-involuntary","tag-mercy-me","tag-oh-dear","tag-pickleball","tag-positive-talk","tag-praise-the-lord","tag-talking-with-mouth-full"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15777"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15777\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15780,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15777\/revisions\/15780"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mypeacezone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}