WWJD?

I went to Catholic school in the 90s so I very much remember those trendy wristbands that said:

WWJD

What would Jesus Do?

Now, they were a little bit cheesy, but they’re actually a genius behavior modification device.

The point of any denomination of Christianity, even the Church of England, is to make people more Christ-like.

And to be Christ-like is complicated.

You have to be familiar with the moral and ethical teachings of the church.

And you have to step back and reflect on every situation to remember, and apply those dogmas to your actions.

It’s a lot of mental work.

And it takes years and years of theological reflection to master.

But by simply asking yourself “What would Jesus Do?” in any situation you simplify the thought process and make action easy and instant.

You don’t have to remember theology, you don’t have to recite your Catechisms, you just have to act.

Too much thought makes action impossible.

Simple frameworks make action easy.

And you can’t become Christ-like by thinking. You have to act.

And that’s funny, because you can’t get in shape by just thinking.

You have to act.

So even if you’re the staunchest atheist who genuflects to your Christopher Hitchens poster every night, and you’re only reading this far to gather enough ammo to post a snarky comment I have some news for you:

This post isn’t about religion at all.

It’s about that simple framework for behavior that will determine your habits, which will determine the quality of your life.

So imagine you’re trying to lose weight.

You know that you need to eat in a caloric deficit, make smart food choices, move more and shift your lifestyle.

That’s a lot of factors, and each one branches out into even more factors that you need to keep in mind when doing, well, anything really. It’s an ever expanding tree of possibilities and choices. It’s exhausting to examine, and almost paralyzing to put into action.

So what if instead of analyzing every single aspect of every single minutiae of every single decision you simply asked yourself:

“What would a healthy person do?”

It would clarify a lot of the choices for you.

It would make every meal easier to choose. It would make the decision to go to the gym or to skip and binge watch Netflix garbage easier.

It would make it simple enough that you could take action.

If you ask yourself that question often enough and act accordingly eventually you won't be "acting" like a healthy person- you'll BE a healthy person.

Because you simplified the complicated and took action.

Consistently.

Is this framework perfect? No. Absolutely not.

But acting like Christ would make you more Christ-like, even if your actions were based on simply treating others well instead of complicated theology.

And acting like a healthy person will make you more healthy, even if it’s not perfect or based on the latest evidence based scheme.

And you wouldn’t even need a neon colored wristband.

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