What's easiest is rarely what is healthiest

​It is one of the crueler facts of life. Unhealthy habits are easier to form than healthy ones.

That's because habits are formed when we do something frequently. If I sit down and play the piano for an hour today, that doesn't help me build a habit near as much as sitting down to play the piano fifteen minutes every single day for the next ten days.

Habits are the natural consequence of doing something frequently.

I think we'd all agree what's easy to do - what is comfortable to do - is much easier to do frequently than what's hard to do. It's easier to scroll social media than play the piano for fifteen minutes.

Yet, what's easy to do - what is comfortable to do - is rarely the healthiest thing to do.

I believe life is calling each and every one of us to a healthy place. I always picture a giant river flowing to that place - a river we're all meant to jump in and swim to that place together in. But there are millions of smaller and seemingly more inviting streams surrounding that river that lead us in the opposite direction.

We keep jumping in those streams, and being swept further and further away from that river, all the while knowing - all the while something inside us nagging - we are supposed to be in that river!

The streams are tricky. They often present themselves as a shortcut. They'll convince you you'll get to float more than you have to swim, they'll convince you the current will cut hours off of your journey, they'll convince you you're the smart one for finding the stream.

But the healthy life isn't about shortcuts. The healthy life longs to swim, not float. The healthy life isn't looking for a shortcut life, it's looking for a best life.

And the smart life, well that's the life that figures out life is hard. It requires a constant push - from you. If you're looking for the easy life, you're going to spend your life in streams and not in the river.

Here's the good news. All habits are formed the exact same way. Doing something frequently. Doing something hard frequently builds a habit just as quickly as doing something easy frequently. It's just harder to do something hard frequently.

It requires a push.

It requires us to constantly push ourselves away from the stream and go to the river.

We all know our streams. We all know the grip they have on us. Just know the river can have that same kind of grip on us. If we'll just jump in it.

When you get to the edge of one of your streams today - tell yourself "push" - and then push away from that stream.

And push toward that river.