CONCENTRATION 727know how natural it is to choose the dearest path. The line of mental
action is precisely the same. It is movement along the lines of least
resistance-passage over the well-worn path.
Habits are created by repetition and are formed in accordance to
a natural law, observable in all animate things and some would say
in inanimate things as well. For instance, a piece of paper once folded
in a certain way will fold along the same lines the next time. Clothing
forms into creases according to the person wearing it and these creases
once formed will remain. All users of any kind of machinery know
that as a machine is first "broken in;' so it will tend to run thereafter.
Rivers and streams cut their courses through the land along the lines
of least resistance. The law is in operation everywhere.
These examples will give you the idea of the nature of habit
and will aid you in forming new mental paths-new mental creases.
The best, and one might say the only, way that old habits may be
broken is to form new habits to counteract and replace the undesir-
able ones. Form new mental paths over which to travel, and soon the
old ones will become less distinct. Every time you travel over the path
of the desirable mental habit, you make that new path deeper and
wider-and so much easier to travel thereafter.
This mental path-making is very important, and I cannot urge you
too strongly to start making the desirable mental paths over which you
wish to travel.
The following are the rules through which you may form the habits
you desire:
- At the beginning of the formation of a new habit, put force and
Enthusiasm into your expression. Feel what you think. Remember
that you are taking the first steps toward making your new mental
paths, and it is much harder at first than it will be afterward. At
the beginning make each path as dear and as deep as you can, so
that you can readily see it the next time you wish to follow it.