Your mom signed you up for piano lessons. Or maybe guitar or saxophone or violin. She drags you off to a teacher. You meet the teacher, who seems forbidding, and are awarded a beginner’s instruction book.
Returning home, mom says, “Now sit down and practice the first lesson. Remember, practice makes perfect.”
She was wrong.
Gasp?!! I’m calling mom wrong? Yep.
Practice makes permanent.
We learn that from habits. We do something a few times, and it becomes a habit. Maybe a good habit like rising from sleep at the same time every day, refreshed and ready for the day. Maybe a bad habit like turning on a TV show to unwind at the end of the day accompanied with a glass of wine and a bag of potato chips.
Perfect practice makes perfect.
Perfect practice demands awareness.
Practicing that pose in Yoga aware that all the body parts are in proper alignment.
Practicing musical scales until muscle memory makes it easy to go up and down the scale and then change keys and do it again.
How about reading material that enhances your brain and emotional stability–spiritual writing, math and science, fiction that activates your imagination? Yes, that, too.
Prayer? Yes. Not just dashing a quick thought (although nothing wrong with that), but disciplining your time to approach a few minutes a day (maybe three times a day like Daniel of the lions fame) with intention.
Meditation? Ten minutes at a regular time daily is enough to get you started toward rewiring your brain and changing your outlook on life.
With intention and awareness. Perfect practice makes perfect.
Faith Venture 
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