THE POSTSCRIPT, Carrie Classon

I am made entirely of habits.

This is not an original observation. Annie Dillard wrote: “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” I either love that quote or hate it, depending on how I spent my day.

I am thinking about this because I was trying to break a habit of mine: sitting up late at my computer, mindlessly scrolling and snacking. I do this because I am tired — not hungry — and I feel too lazy to read a book or do anything useful, but it seems too early to go to bed. So instead, I end up full of peanuts and chocolate chips. I don’t sleep well, and I don’t fit into my jeans. I have concluded that this is not a good habit. So I resolved to break it.

It was very hard the first night. Once again, I was tired and convinced I was hungry. I was not, but weariness and hunger are close cousins, and I had grown accustomed to managing weariness with food. I resisted and had a hard time sleeping. I felt rather discouraged about the whole idea of breaking an old and cherished habit.

But I did it again the second night, and I was surprised that it was noticeably easier. The night after that, it took almost no effort at all. I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but I am now going on a week without my late-night snacks, and I am starting to feel that this is not such a great sacrifice after all. It’s starting to feel normal. It’s becoming a habit.

Over time, habits become a lot more than habits; that’s what I realized. Habits are who I am. I am in the habit of walking five miles a day — therefore, I am a walker. The neighbors say “hello” as I go by. The dogs know me. I have a habit of writing every day. Writing every day is no longer a habit — I am a writer.

The habits that define me are both good and bad. I consume too much social media, and it shapes how I view the world. I eat a lot of vegetables, and I become healthier. I started meditating, and now I feel unsettled if I don’t do it regularly. If I practiced my Spanish, I would become a Spanish speaker — but I don’t.

One after another, the habits are acquired — and very occasionally dropped — and they define and redefine who I am. Because my life is ruled by habits. Most of the time, this isn’t a bad thing. I make surprisingly few actual decisions in the course of the day. Very little energy, thought or willpower is put into most of what I do because I did it yesterday and the day before that. Only a change takes effort.

I now wonder if I don’t have a lot of habits that I engage in every day without noticing. I judge situations too quickly and get annoyed with people too easily simply because they are not doing something I expect them to do. I do this habitually — usually without thinking.

Before I can change anything, I first have to notice what I am doing. I have to stop long enough to recognize that, somewhere along the line, this habit has become me. These habitual attitudes are harder to see. But now that I’m looking for them, I’m not sure it’s harder to change these habits than any other habit.

It surely can’t be harder than resisting peanuts and chocolate chips before bedtime.

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