“It takes 30 days to make a habit.”

“You have to do something 17 times before it becomes habit.”

“If you practice something for one hour a day, it will be a habit in 3 weeks.”

How long does it really take?

I dunno.

I can start a habit in 30 seconds if you pass me one of your Vicodin and give me a bite of that vodka.

On the same token, I will never form a habit if you try to make me do something that I don’t want to do.

I hate brushing my teeth. I have hated brushing my teeth since the day I had teeth. I don’t know if I would call brushing my teeth a habit or not. It is something that I do because I know it’s something that is supposed to be done.

I hate going to school. I never liked going to class and still today, I cringe at the thought of being made to sit through a class of any type in a formal educational environment. I went to school for thirty years. I don’t know if I would call it habit. It was something I did because I knew it was something that needed to be done.

I think sometimes holding out hope that something will become habit is my way of believing that someday it will become easy. At times, I can be so lazy that I will convince myself not to start something because I think that the road to forming a habit will be too long and uncomfortable. The truth is, the time it takes to form a habit is irrelevant in the face of determination.

The hardest hitters that I have ever known have had the ability to make something habit the moment they decided it was going to be a habit. That is also called conviction and it is formed through passion, determination, and drive. The biggest players in the game can form a habit at the point of impact- whenever they decide to slam the gavel. Something gets lodged in their brain and they decide that it will be that way until they decide that it will not.

I am not doubting the power of habit but if I had to make a decision between being comfortable in the air or having the balls to jump, I’d rather be a jumper. A habit is the result of something done, a result and not the goal.

I don’t have to work at forming a habit, I just have to work. Habits are much larger and deeper than anything I can control.

Peace, Love, and all things Beef related,

Beefcake