Regularity

I have this bookmark set to open up with Firefox (don't you just love this browser!) automatically, so I have to consciously choose NOT to write an entry everyday. Some days I just click it shut without giving it a thought. Other times I think that I SHOULD do it -- I started this thing, so I should follow through. It occurs to me that this is a lot like my attitude toward prayer.

Some of us at Countryside Christian Church are on a special journey during Lent, with the goal being that we will learn to be more comfortable sharing our faith with others. We mainliners are pretty darn private about our faith, and we're not too good at putting words to why we continue to be disciples of Jesus Christ. A big part of this journey is to pray daily for 30 minutes. Of course we're not dictatorial about it, but it is an expectation. So every day I am faced with the decision: whether or not to pray, when to pray, where to pray. The "bookmark" opens every morning when I wake up and remains open until I lay down at night. I can decide to close it or open it, but I can't ignore it.

I'm more successful when I know where and when I'm going to pray, rather than having to decide those things. So when I'm here in my office, it's first thing in the morning on my couch. That's the easy do; the only thing that stands in my way is if I do ANYTHING else first and get distracted. So I try to open the door, light the candle and get started, with no distractions. The harder part is when I'm not coming to my office. There is no quiet place in my house, except my closet. So last Sunday evening I went into my messy closet, the one with the big blue trash bag full of clothes that I don't wear and my husbands dusty suits that he hasn't worn in 20 years but refuses to give away, and I set up my little altar of candle on the little fireproof file box, sat down on the floor and began praying. Amazingly -- it actually works. That's one more bookmark that opens automatically that compels me to do what I know I should do.

The other wonderful thing about regularity in anything is that the more I do it, the more I want to do it. Shoulds, oughts and musts turn into iwannas. Iwannas are good; they are even fun sometimes. The trick is to do something regularly long enough to turn them into iwannas. Yet even very regular iwannas sometimes slip back to idonwannas, and then I have to decide all over again whether or not to open the bookmark.

Regularity -- it has its upside. But its not foolproof.