In my inaugural blog post of the
year, I would like to impress upon all the readers of this blog that this year
is not so different from the previous ones and therefore there is no need for any
euphoria. Nothing changes literally,
except for the calendar. In its own inimitable way, the body keeps on doing
what it does best, that is to keep going and
mind does what it does best, that is to keep
meandering.
The purpose of my life and I don’t want
to speak for others, is to live with this conflict and to not seek perfect
harmony of body and mind. I want to completely immerse my body within my mind
and also try vice versa, so that they can understand each other better. I guess
conflict is important, disagreements are vital to provoke mind out of its slumber.
Just the other day, I was eating my favorite sweets and the body wanted more
but the mind interrupted and kept the glucose levels under check. Yes, it’s a trivial
example, nevertheless an important because I don’t want to totally surrender to
the tyranny of either of these two and I want them to fight it out each time
and nudge me towards the right direction. There are numerous instances of body
over mind and mind over body moments and not all could be unanimously termed as
‘right’. So should there be a rule that will ensure that the outcome is always,
just about always positive? At the risk of sounding didactic, I
think such rules can be made and put to use every time there is a conflict
between body and mind. I want to call it a rule of 3 regrets, which goes as
follows
- Are you going to regret this decision at night?
- Are you going to regret this decision 1 month later?
- Are you going to regret this decision 1 year later?
In order to proceed with the
decision, you must get a negative on all 3. Critics of this approach might say that in
real life, one doesn’t get so much time to decide specially for trivial stuffs
like eating an entire bar of chocolate. I think we can devise a mental model
that would have already accounted for these circumstances and therefore the
reaction would be automatic rather than thought through. This approach can be
pushed deeper into our subconscious brain, so that our automatic reaction to
life’s shenanigans is leading us to a positive outcome. Apologists for status
quo need to come up with a better response as one cannot expect repeated abject
submission to fate.This approach doesn’t aim to
destroy the conflict and seek the elusive harmony, in fact it welcomes such
conflicts and implores all of us to devise an intelligent response.
