Since last summer I have been in two minds regarding my old dog. On the one hand, it was clear that his age was catching up with him; on the other hand, he was still doing well considering his grand age of 15+. Recently it became increasingly painful to watch the dog struggling and eventually I had to bite the bullet and make the hard decision to put him down. With the dog gone, I realised how I had developed certain habits and routines in my life because of his permanent presence. They became “second nature”, things done in specific ways at specific times and so on without too much thinking about them. In fact, this is the way we are able to cope with our everyday lives and their challenges. We are creatures of habits; we create and develop them, so our mind isn’t constantly overloaded with the amount of information it has to process. Going about on autopilot leaves us enough mental bandwidth to deal with unexpected circumstances, happenings or events. This instinctive ability to create routines is a good thing most of the time. However, there are situations when responding routinely can put us and/or others in danger. A simple example is a traffic reorganisation on a stretch of the road we are familiar with. Not so long ago I almost went through a red light on North Anderson Drive where the new Haudagain Bypass forks out. Another dangerous thing about routines is that we can develop bad habits; at the extreme end of the range, we call them addictions. Bad habits are in fact the main reason why we repeat our mistakes, fall into the same trap over and over again and commit similar sins. We simply react or deal with challenges the only way our mind knows.
As I mentioned last week, for many Catholics the perspective of confessing sins to a priest is the ultimate stumbling block. The penultimate step in our Lenten series “Five Steps to a Good Confession” can be similarly discouraging: ‘Resolve to amend your life’. Quite often I feel exasperation and frustration when my attempts at changing things repeatedly fail and I return to my bad old ways. Sometimes we might not see a solution, don’t have enough mental strength to change things, or are entangled in situations that apparently cannot be changed without a huge upset. Consequently, my inability to ‘resolve to amend my life’ renders the whole process worthless, ineffective, or false. The main subconscious misconception here is thinking that I have to promise not to repeat my errors or sins while knowing myself I expect to fail; it’s only a matter of time. Because I have used the word ‘misconception’ you can rightly expect me to present the right meaning of the fourth step: ‘Resolve to amend your life’.
There are two main aspects to this step. The initial one is my decision that I want to correct, improve or change things in my life for the better. It’s a mental step which is absolutely necessary to succeed. This is not a promise that things will change but a determination to change them. In other words, it’s setting a goal or target you aim to reach or achieve. If you don’t know where you are going, you can’t find the way. It’s like satnav in your car; it will not show you the route unless you have entered your destination of travel. There are two very common mistakes we make at this level. One is that we want to change everything, and the other is the vagueness of our goal (for example, ‘I want to be better”). Due to our mental limitations, we cannot change everything at once. Instead, decide on one thing, the one that bothers you the most. Secondly, set an achievable and verifiable goal, so you can measure your progress and make corrections or tweak your efforts along the way. For example, saying that ‘I want to be a good person’ sounds jolly good but it’s too vague. But if I commit myself to spend one hour daily helping others that’s a much more solid, measurable resolution. Having set a goal to achieve, it’s time to find ways to put the plan into action.
In my first sermon in this series, I talked about ‘the examination of conscience’ as the way to find deeper reasons or patterns for our repeated mistakes, shortcomings or sins rather than counting them like a kind of moral accountant. Now, having established what I want to change I can address those specific reasons or patterns. In the second sermon, I defined ‘sin as an incorrect way of fulfilling our rightful needs.’ Consequently, I have to find the correct ways of fulfilling my rightful needs. In other words, I have to replace bad habits with new, good habits. The main reason why we fail in our attempts at changing things is that we try to get rid of a bad thing without filling the void with anything good. Aristotle coined the phrase “nature abhors a vacuum” and it’s certainly true about human nature. Having tried for years to lose weight unsuccessfully, one January evening I embarked on another attempt. This time better informed, I stopped eating high-calorie foodstuff as the source of sugar that my body needed and replaced it with fruits. Half a year later I had to order a new, tailor-made, slimmer kilt to wear at my friends’ wedding; in other words, I achieved my goal. Moreover, years later I – more or less – keep my weight in check.
As the old saying goes, ‘habit is second nature’ which means it’s not easy to change it quickly. It operates on an instinctive level and we are semi-aware of it at best. In practical terms, it means that in the process of replacing bad habits with good ones, we will fall back every now and again. However, instead of giving up after the failure, use it as a learning experience. Why did I fail and what can I do to avoid failing again? You need patience, you need to learn and tweak your ways accordingly. Failure is an essential part of the whole process; we should not seek it, but when it inevitably happens, use it to your advantage.
The last but not least aspect of the step ‘Resolve to amend your life’ is making changes to your personal, domestic or social environment. It can be something small; for example, I don’t keep biscuits or cakes in my larder; if I did it would only be a matter of time before I devoured them. So, whenever I’m kindly gifted some, I generously (and quickly) share them with you after Sunday Mass tea and coffee. Sometimes decisions have to be more radical, they are harder to make, and consequences are heavy, for example cutting off unhealthy relationships. That’s why sometimes we procrastinate, we sit on the fence unable or unwilling to make up our minds. However, paradoxically, indecisiveness is a decision made, though it’s the worst one. If that’s the case, get off the fence and do something. “Dreams don’t work unless you do.”
