Upsides Down

I have a bad habit... I am constantly doubting myself. There is a continuous murmuring in my head: Was that the right thing to do? The best thing to do? How could it have been done differently? Would a change here/there have made this/that better? Arguing with that critical voice has been a theme in my life ever since I can remember but now... Now that I have made a choice that makes my decisions important to the lives and well being of others, now that I homeschool, that voice has become even more insistent. Knowing what the right choices are/were is hard since the truth of them won't be seen for years. And to make matters worse, I worry that I may have communicated this voice to my children, that they, like me have developed the voice that questions and challenges their decisions on a regular basis.


Now, to some degree, I suppose, a critical voice is important. To never question what one is doing is the surest road to error but I wish I could train myself and, more importantly, my children, that once a decision IS made, one must move forward. Previous possibilities are now moot and worrying about the 'What ifs' is a waste of time and energy. Human life, after all, is really very short. We none of us knows how long we have here. Surely it is wiser to spend the time ACCOMPLISHING the good than worrying about what might have been.  My question is... how is this training to be accomplished?

Now I am a fervent admirer of Charlotte Mason's educational philosophy. From everything I have read, she was a brilliant lady -- and one of the people that I would love to have met. She has, in her educational approach, something called 'Habit Training'. (For those of you interested, there is a wonderful blog called: Charlotte Mason Help which discusses implementing her strategies.  There is also a downloadable e-book called "Laying down the Rails: A Charlotte Mason Habits Handbook") For my purposes, it is her direction on how to form a habit, through the application of 'whole attention' that interests me here. Charlotte Mason said: We think, as we are accustomed to think; ideas come and go and carry on a ceaseless traffic in the rut––let us call it––you have made for them in the very nerve substance of the brain. You do not deliberately intend to think these thoughts; you may, indeed, object strongly to the line they are taking"  She then goes on to discuss the formation of habits, with the most important habit (to her way of thinking -- and it turns out, mine!) being that of attention. Of course, she is discussing the creation of habits in children, with the aim of making life 'easier' as well as better for everyone involved. But it occurs to me that her ideas might well be turned on adults and on the habits of the mind. Foremost of these approaches is taking on 'one habit at a time.' I'll admit, this is truly challenging for me. I want to multi-task. I always feel as if there is MORE I should be doing in the limited time that I have at my disposal. Charlotte Mason was right, however. To change/create a habit, one must FOCUS attention, complete attention, on that habit. If one does anything else, the mind will run away and wander off on rabbit trails -- and it is not just the child's mind that does this. Adults do it too hence the strictures of meditation that tell the individual "At first, our mind will be very busy, and we might even feel that the meditation is making our mind busier; but in reality we are just becoming more aware of how busy our mind actually is. There will be a great temptation to follow the different thoughts as they arise, but we should resist this and remain focused" 


So there it is. If I wish to change my habit of mind -- and in so doing, free my children of that same critical habit -- I need to devote my focused attention on doing so. Hmmm... now, what would Ms. Mason say? I suspect she would require a positive voice, as opposed to simply denying the negative. I therefore, and perhaps with the assistance of my children, need to create a dialogue to implement in place of the critical one. At the moment a decision is made, I should train myself, and my children, to say internally 'The decision is made. We move forward from here, taking as they come the results of that decision and not wasting energy on what might have been.' Sounds good. Now to implement it!