Two key questions that come up for me when I am trying to walk in a discipline:
1. What keeps me FROM this?
2. What drives me TO this?
The first question is ready because it brings guilt. “I know I’m supposed to study the Word, but…” We can come up with reasons: “I can’t get my alarm to work. I can’t wake up with my alarm. I get too busy.” We all know the drill.
The second question is harder to ask, but I have found it more helpful because it goes to motivation. It is about passion.
When I sit and think about a discipline, say the study of the Word, and think about what really has drawn me in before… I remember the passion. I remember the excitement. The love is stirred up once again.
We do need to identify what keeps us FROM a discipline. We simply need the obstacles out of the way.
But we do need to stir up original passions as well. We need to have those underlying passions drive us TO spiritual formation so that “first love” mentality keeps us in the practices we so desperately need.
