Good Habits

To develop good habits you must nourish them with good action; and to do this it is necessary to seek good company. Environment (in particular, the company you keep) is very important, for it is stronger than will power.

Paramahansa Yogananda, The Divine Romance

What a telling short two sentences written circa 1930 by one of the twentieth centuries greatest yogis. It goes right along with a saying that is popular among my friends: you can act your way into right thinking, but you cannot think your way into right action.

This collection of many sermons, speeches, and writings of Yogananda is ripe with gems like this one. If we take his words at face value, he would seem to be telling us that we are the company we keep. In other words, you are what you eat.

Surround yourself with good people, and you have a better chance of becoming one yourself. I don't think the yogi is imagining that it will happen by osmosis but that it will occur of its own accord. Like begets like. It's interesting the reliance he places on people. He alludes that it is through people we learn our most basic lessons of how to act.

We are not islands. We do not exist in isolation. From birth, we are surrounded by people. I quite agree with him that from the age we are capable of doing so, we must hunt out the best possible people to have in our lives. It's like picking the best possible fruit at the market. To enjoy good health, we must eat wholesome food, and to enjoy a wholesome life, we must seek out genuine people.