7 Everyday Habits of Spiritually Healthy People

We are masters at planning our lives, our children's lives, and even the lives of our community and workplace. We teach our children at young ages to begin thinking toward life successes: education, athletics, scholarships, careers, investments, financial freedom, and the like. And while these aren't unimportant, they're not the healthiest focus if you want to develop a healthy spiritual walk.

Those focuses are centered around our very short, mortal lives. We tend to view this world and this life as our home. It is our main focus. Instead, spiritually healthy people live daily with the promise of eternity and fellowship with God in mind. Their decisions for this life are influenced by the impact those decisions will have in eternity and for the glory of God.

Living with an eternal focus will more likely than not change your priorities, relationships, and the environment within which you have built your life. If you decide to make it a habit to live with an eternal focus, you will be amazed at the spiritual health benefits you receive when the things of today become far more temporary and much less critical.

Admittedly, this does go hand in hand with the concept of meditation. But we also live in a world where—to steal an old adage—we've adopted the tyranny of the urgent. Everything is frenetic and immediate. We book our days back to back with minimal margin for error, which means, inevitably, little time for rest.

But it's in the rest that we can hear the voice of God speaking to our spirits. It's in the rest that we can take the opportunity to refocus on eternity. In the rest, we are rejuvenated to keep going in our faith, draw on His Word, and seek the leading of the Holy Spirit.

Rest is a habit that doesn't equal laziness, it emphasizes wisdom and centering oneself in their relationship with God. Which, of course, leads to spiritual health.

Do you guard your thoughts? Do you take inventory of what you're focusing on and what you're putting into your mind and soul? In the 1980s, there was a song that played off of the newly burgeoning computer technology, and kids would sing the lyrics, "input, output, what goes in is what comes out."

We can target the obvious things to guard our thoughts against: immorality, unnecessary violence, cruelty, and vices. But have you thought about the other, less obvious concepts we should guard against? Like dwelling on the "what-ifs" that become addictive worries? Or focusing on the wrongs of others against us and our own personal justification for being offended?

These negative and intrusive thoughts can seep in and become normal. They're the ones that separate us from thinking like Christ and pull us away from His goodness and righteousness.

Make a habit of taking inventory of your thoughts and guarding against ones that harm you.

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Do you consider yourself a contented person? By this, I don't mean mixing up contentment with being at peace. I mean, can you step back and look at your life and say you are truly content in all things? Are you focusing on resting in God's provisions for your life, or are you chasing more and better and bigger? Are you resting in God's timing, or are you running at breakneck speed to try to accomplish what you need to accomplish?

Contentment is something to take a serious look at. How much simpler and more God-centered would your life be if you simplified? Are you discontent with living a life where your primary pursuit is deepening your relationship with Christ and furthering the kingdom of God?

It's not easy to practice being content, but the spiritually healthy tend to do this regularly. They prioritize their passions to be focused upward instead of inward and seek to find contentment in the Lord rather than the circumstances around them.

Compassion seems to be in low doses these days. Maybe it's the opening the world up to our fingertips with social media, but people tend to say what they want when they're a safe distance away with a phone screen. There's also an element of entitlement that is prevalent in society. We tend to think we're owed something, or something is ours because of status, our right to be first, our personal traumas and injustices, or what-have-you.

But the habit of being compassionate is also the habit of taking your eyes off yourself. This means you are setting others up to be more important than you. It's the first shall be last and the last shall be first concept. It's the idea that even if you're right, an ounce of compassion goes much farther than a pound of criticism.

Now, be cautious. This isn't to say that compassion requires you to be accepting of sin and things the Lord has defined as disobedience or unrighteousness. But compassion does include the extension of grace, of coming alongside, of loving in spite of, and of learning to be humble in your approach to others. There's no doubt stones probably should be cast, but are you the one without sin to cast the stone?

Compassion is often more convicting than passing supreme judgement that only God has the right to give. In the end, sometimes we just need to come alongside and be there, in the midst of the ick, the pain, and the struggle.

What is discernment? It's the ability to recognize, understand, and judge wisely—especially when it comes to your spiritual walk. This means avoiding knee-jerk reactions and emotional impulses and making choices based on what feels right rather than what Scripture teaches is right.

Think about it. If you were to practice the habit of discernment, you would also be practicing other habits in order to be discerning. You'd be listening, distinguishing a truth from a lie, using critical thinking, and aligning your thinking with God's through prayer, Scripture, and seeking wise counsel.

Discernment isn't as readily practiced today. It's more about feelings, preferences, and desires. While those elements aren't necessarily invalid, remember: logic should influence emotions, not the other way around. And logic is found through discerning truth. And truth is found by seeking the Truth.

Are you teachable? This one can be hard to practice. It means taking corrections and applying them to our lives. This means not only do we hear and acknowledge correction, but we don't just leave it there as an observation given to us. We also apply corrections. In other words, we learn, we grow, we change, and we adopt.

This habit of being teachable can really change the way you approach your walk with the Lord. We like to read Scripture and find what we're looking for written somewhere so it fits the narrative we want to read. Instead, we need to read Scripture to read what it is saying and learn from the context of the full passage and history surrounding that text. We may not like what we find. We may wish God hadn't said so. We may even be offended. But if we are humble and bend our knee before God, then we can invite Him in to teach us, correct us, and help as change to be more like Him.

In the end, there are so many habits of spiritually healthy people. Be on the lookout for more. Write them down as they come to mind. Dwell on them. Ask yourself if this is a habit you might need to pay special attention to.

And most of all, take joy in seeking the heart of God!