5 Seeds to Plant Today, Infinite Potential to Harvest Tomorrow

Everyday you are planting a seed that you will harvest at a time in the future.  What you plant today (this season) you harvest tomorrow (next season).  Then tomorrow becomes today, and again you plant for tomorrow.  Have I lost you yet?

Q1: What do you do if you want to become proficient at the guitar, cooking, or golf?
A1: PRACTICE

Q2: What is practice?
A2: To REPEATedly exercise or perform an activity or skill so as to acquire or maintain proficiency in it

Q3: What is a repeated exercise?
A3: HABIT

Q4: So in lay terms, what is a habit?
A4: Something you do frequently (let’s say daily) in order to get better at a skill

“And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” – Galatians 6:9

Whatever your habits are today, you will reap the results of during the harvest.  Good habits lead to proficiency in good things (time management, relationships, public speaking).  Bad habits lead to proficiency in bad things (procrastination, bitterness, poor health).

If you really wish to develop good skills, I recommend following John Maxwell’s advice and asking yourself “What are five things I must do today to be successful?”

As John explains, it all comes down to what you do daily.  This might seem overwhelming at first; that’s okay.  I want to challenge you to start by recognizing one bad habit you currently have and identifying at least one goal that habit negatively impacts.  Then determine what good habit you should be practicing instead.  Spend the next eight weeks doing one thing every day that you would like to become your new good habit (remember, the results of practice do not come immediately, but from repeated exercise.)  If you like, come back and let me know how your life has changed, and what progress you have made toward that goal.

Finally, look back at the second question and remember that once you are good at something, it still takes practice to maintain your competence in it.