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Show YOUR HABITS How many of your actions are "thought out" in advance? How many are mechancial. without thought the result of habit? Did it ever' occur to you why you always sit at the same place during meals instead in-stead of moving to a chair at another side of the table? Habit largely. Men, in putting on your trousers in the morning, which leg goes first right or left? "Why not the other? How a-bout a-bout shoes? Here's an interesting in-teresting experiment you can perform. Take a door that is used often. Reverse this door so that the hinges will be where the knob formerly was. Then watch. You'll find people peo-ple coming up and, though looking straight at the familiar door, they'll reach for the side where the knob used to be. Habit again. Each of us has his own peculiar way ol opening mail. One person tears off a corner of the envel" ope and inserts a finger. Another An-other tears off the whole end. Still another slits the flap with a pencil, or hunts the scissors. All done mechanically, including includ-ing the habit of holding envel opes to the light before opening. open-ing. This, perhaps, comes from a subconscious hope that there's money inside. There's no way of figuring it out exactly, but at least half of our actions must be mechanically mechanic-ally performed, without .thinking, .think-ing, the result of habit. Life is largely routine, and routine develops habit. Are you a slave to habit? It is the worst form of slavery, for by it a man enslaves himself, especially his thought and potential powers of originality. And the habit of automatonism unthinking, involuntary action can be as injurious to our careers as the vicious habits, such as drugs and liquor. "Getting in a rut" is usually due to becoming becom-ing the victim of habit. Here's where system and efficiency short-circuit themselves, for habit destroys initiative. Telegram. |