大象传媒

Mark Tully looks at the regular behaviours we develop consciously or subconsciously, whether good or bad, and asks why it is so difficult to change our habits. He hears how humans are helped to learn through habit, and about how habitual behaviours have contributed to our evolution as a species.

From Buddhist chanting to the Lord鈥檚 Prayer, Mark explores the role of habit in religious life, drawing on the words of Gerard Manley Hopkins whose poem, The Habit of Perfection, outlines the old habits the poet should cast aside and the new ones he should learn to rejoice in when casting off the clothes of a layman and putting on the habit of a priest.

The habits we might not be proud of are represented in music by Tom Waits, who, when he plays badly, blames his piano for drinking, rather than facing the truth about himself. On the other hand, the 15th century composer Guillaume Dufay鈥檚 setting of Ave Maris Stella, Hail Mary, Star of the Sea, the hymn to Mary in the office of Vespers monks sing daily, is perhaps a more uplifting example of habitual behaviour.

Whilst Mark takes advice, from some of the readings in the programme, not to fight hard against bad habits but to try to change our ways gently, he does not take them as lightly as Mark Twain who said, 鈥淨uitting smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I have done it thousands of times.鈥�