Meditate | Adverse Learning

Meditate is a monthly column in which insights gained from meditating on the Word are shared. We welcome your insights, too, in the form of comments or even your own article. Contact us if you'd like to write a submission for this column. -Editor

“Cease to do evil, learn to do good” (Isaiah 1:16-17).

“In the day of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity consider: surely God has appointed the one as well as the other” (Ecclesiastes 7:14).

The other day I read a very clear statement that speaks to an ongoing issue in my spiritual growth: it’s okay to feel angry, it’s not okay to act on it. This statement came into my mind like a drop of soap in dirty water. After reading it, I went about my day and had the idea to track when I felt angry—to approach this feeling with curiosity, to “consider in the day of adversity.” The only “action” I would take when I felt angry was to make a note of what triggered my anger. It was surprisingly satisfying, rather than to have no action to take when I am feeling anger, to have something specific I would do—write it down, or in most cases, dictate it to a note on my phone! After doing this just for one day, I felt an ease, and less fear when the anger came up, because it no longer meant I acted out in a way I would regret a moment later.

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4 Reasons Most New Year's Resolutions and Other Habit Changes Fail and What You Can Do to Succeed

Derrick's essay on effective habit changing is appropriately timed with the turning of the New Year. He explores the reasons why people so often lose their resolve and fall back into familiar patterns. He offers short and simple recommendations for making lasting changes and he also provides further reading from the Writings of Emanual Swedenborg and the Bible.

Making and keeping resolutions to change habits is hard. You will probably see a lot of blog posts or magazine articles about making and keeping your New Year's Resolution this time of year. The New Church offers some new perspective about what goes wrong when we try and fail to change our ways. Here are four things that often go wrong and what you can do to prevent or fix the problems.

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