Using Habits in Personal Training

The importance of good habits is an often repeated refrain with Charlotte Mason, who believed whole-heartedly that parents were  to instill good habits in their children from early childhood.

“The habits of the child produce the character of the man . . .every day, every hour, the parents are either passively or actively forming those habits in their children upon which, more than upon anything else, future character and conduct depend.”

First of all, Ms. Mason thought children were to be raised with the idea that they are not their own.  In other words, children, just as their

parents, hold their lives in a sacred trust from the Creator.  They were created for God’s purposes, and it is their job to develop  healthy bodies and minds in order to be ready to fulfill that special purpose for which they were created.  In other words, children are to be taught from the beginning that they are living under a greater Authority than themselves. What a contrast to the child-centered culture in which we live!

One of the many byproducts of good habits is that they make behavior automatic.  If you regularly perform a certain task, such as getting up and immediately making your bed, over and over again, it becomes automatic.  If you get up and do it ten times, you probably still are thinking about it every morning. But if you do it one hundred times, or a thousand times, you do it ‘on automatic pilot’  without thinking about it at all.  It is a simple task that takes absolutely no thought and not much more effort.  However, if it is not a habit, one has to decide every day to do it. Thoughts like this creep in: Do I feel like doing it?  Do I have time to do it?  If I don’t do it, maybe my mom will do it for me.  Or, my personal favorite, I will come back later and do it, I promise.  

Carrying one’s own dishes to the kitchen counter, putting away ones’ own clothes, shoes, toys, etc., brushing one’s teeth after eating, feeding a pet, and making a bed can all be accomplished by the youngest of children with loving, consistent training beginning well before they are ’school-aged.’

Without this training,  we would be constantly struggling with our children and there would be no time left to get anything done, let alone schoolwork, with us fussing and/or following our children around all the time enforcing the completion of these relentless tasks. A harmonious household was Charlotte Mason’s goal for families, and this can not be the case without constant, reliable training of good habits.

Charlotte Mason’s Suggested Physical Habits

• Self-Restraint:  using one’s time wisely and  productively rather than being lazy or self-indulgent

• Self-Control: Staying focused and on task, rather than being upset by minor annoyances.  Cultivating a tolerant, pleasant, patient attitude rather than being quick to whine or complain when conditions aren’t exactly as we would like them.

• Self-Discipline:  Teaching children to be consistently clean, neat and orderly, no matter where they are—at home, at a friend’s or at Grandma’s.

• Alertness: Teaching children to actively seek ways to serve others.  Opening doors, carrying something for mother or a younger sibling, completing a task that needs to be done rather than waiting for someone else to do it, or helping Dad with something without being asked are all benefits of teaching your child to be alert.

• Fortitude:  Given the right inspiration, most children’s natural heroic tendencies become activated and can produce an astounding amount of perseverance and tenacity.  Reading about the physical heroism of the Spartans or the knight’s Code of Chivalry can help promote this idea in your young ones.

• Service:  This is another habit that is promoted by delightful examples of selfless service in excellent children’s literature such as The Box-Car Children. Boxcar. series for younger elementary or Amos Fortune, Free Man (Newbery Library, Puffin), for older elementary children.

• Courage: Again, by reading fine literature as well as emulating examples around them, children learn courage, as opposed to recklessness.

• Caution:  Another word for discernment, Ms. Mason describes caution as preserving our health and ability to serve God and others by acting thoughtfully rather than hastily and possibly harming ourselves or perhaps our siblings or friends.
  

• Purity: The last of the physical habits, the need for purity is best summed up by  1 Corinthians 6:19: Do you not know that your body is a temple for the Holy Spirit, Whom you have received from God?  Ms. Mason believed that if children are raised with this concept when they are young, they will have a reverence for their body that will be supported by their actions.

As parents, we are wise when we realize the value of instilling these habits into our children beginning at an early age.  Our daily, often hour by hour training using inspiring examples from our literature and stories as well as gentle, loving correction will produce children who are ready and able to manage their own bodies and accept the responsibilities laid upon them by their parents as they continue to grow and mature.

Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary.  Galatians 6:9

Let us encourage one another in our high calling,

Next:  Forming Intellectual Habits