Habits: The Mother’s Secret to Success

I was a bit in awe as I wandered through her house, admiring artistic evidence of order, creativity, educational excellence. I silently read through their simple schedule, written on the wall. I noted the chores, the tidy spaces, the books stacked. Of course I know people clean before guests come, but there was nothing fake about this. It wasn’t pretentious or Pinteresty, just a simple picture of an ordered, lovely life.

Not a word was needed, immediately I knew what was missing, why I was feeling so hopelessly overwhelmed, so unmotivated and lethargic.

I laid it out for her, plain and simple, and asked for help: We needed structure, we need purpose. The go-with-the-flow thing is great on the days when everything’s falling into place, when I’m energized and happy and feeling creative and spontaneous. But what about the other 359 days of the year? I feel like I’m a slave to whim and feelings, I feel like our days are too aimless, I find myself bouncing from thing to thing, based on the kids’ passing fancy. I need a renewed passion and purpose for disciplining, nurturing, and educating our kids.

She listened thoughtfully.

“Have you read anything by Charlotte Mason?”

I was embarrassed to admit I had not. There are so many educational methods out there, it all makes my head spin and the last thing I wanted was another book telling me to scrap everything and go a whole new way. But I was ready to read anything, especially after seeing my friend’s infectious joy and experiencing the peace of her ordered, lovely home. She encouraged me to just pick one, and give it a shot. She assured me that I was probably doing “Charlotte Mason” I just didn’t know it. We already spend tons of time outside and read a lot of books. This wasn’t going to be anything entirely new or foreign. It just might give me some inspiration.

Since I’m hopelessly frugal, I skimmed through the Charlotte Mason materials on Amazon until I found a 99-cent volume simply called, Habits.

Okay. Habits. Here we go.

Well within minutes I was reading aloud to Jeff, interjecting, “YES! Yes, this is IT! This is what I’ve been missing. THIS is why I’ve felt hopeless. YES!”

Put quite simply: Life is overwhelming. Homeschooling is overwhelming. Parenting is overwhelming. The Christian life is overwhelming. There are so many options, things to do, things to read, places to go, people to see. My phone’s blowing up with notifications and there’s a bazillion things I should be doing right now, and quite frankly I’m not doing very well at anything, I’m not very good at anything, and neither are my kids and so let’s just QUIT.

*sigh*

Of course I wouldn’t have said that, but there was a bit of that in my heart. Just overwhelm. But Charlotte Mason’s words from the 1800s cut through the cacophony of this crazy culture (and my crazy mind!) and flowed like a soothing balm for my harried soul. She spoke such wisdom, straight to my heart.

My overwhelm came from decision-fatigue. Where we have poor habits, we are forcing our minds to constantly re-decide something. This haphazard, undisciplined mind is exhausted. So many options. So much to do. So little discipline. So few good habits. Where to begin?

Focus. Focus on one and only one habit (virtue) for 4-6 weeks and master that one thing. Reward for character and conduct, not cleverness. Except exact and immediate obedience in the one habit and work tirelessly on that area until it is mastered.

By the time I finished the short volume, I had a clear vision of what we needed. I could see where I’d been lax, I could see what virtues and character qualities we’d failed to live out and failed to instill in our kids. It was painfully obvious but profoundly encouraging, because I felt for the first time in ages, that there was hope. I had a plan, a purpose, a passion and vision for my children, our home, my writing life and homeschool life. I could see how these habits would touch every bit of life because everything’s connected.

I had so much fun dreaming up ideas, plans, and ways to reinforce our new simple habits. I wrote little songs for the kids to help them remember important things. They were thrilled because I cut out everything unnecessary in order to focus in on just a few crucial things. The result was, instead of feeling mildly disappointed by them because I was expecting many different things but not really reinforcing any of them, I was only expecting a few things and was enthusiastically enforcing them every single time. This meant I was basically happy with them way more often. Hooray!

So I share this not as an “I’ve arrived” thing, I think you probably understand that. But I share this because at about 2 1/2 weeks in, it has profoundly affected our days, it’s given me fresh hope and purpose, it’s helped us tackle things that have felt overwhelming for months. It’s brought new joy into our home, and it’s brought back the joy and zeal for life I’d been lacking recently.

Habits. Who knew?  The tiny decisions, made faithfully over and over and over (and over and over) — this is what transforms our lives. And now, if you’ll excuse me, my writing time is over (one of my new habits!) so I’m off to read aloud to my kids. 😉

{Thank you for reading.}

Find Habits for 99-cents here!