There are days when you get back to home after dealing with a “hectic day” or “mean people” , we might even replay those events in our head even after we are done with it, in the meantime, what we forget is to value time and we tend to ignore this constant ticking of time not because we don’t value it, but because we are distracted by our emotions creating a sad chorus. Its completely normal ,that happens to ‘almost’ everyone and that’s the reason why everybody cannot be successful. “Almost” makes a humongous difference.

“The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is that little extra.” ~ Jimmy Johnson

Some years ago, I had read a story in a newspaper .It goes like this:

A monk and his disciple were walking back to their monastery. It was a difficult way and the roads were tough as it was a hilly region. On their way to the monastery there was a huge river flowing across the pathway though less violently.

There was an young lady sitting close to the river, whose village was just across the river, she was scared to cross the river by herself, she asked the monk to help her cross the river.

“Sure , don’t worry” said the monk and carried her up in his arms and they crossed the river, he let her down, and she went to her village after thanking him. The disciple saw the whole act and he was a bit disturbed.

They went to their monastery after couple of hours of exhausting walk in the hills, the disciple was still not calm, sensing it the monk asked him what the matter was. The disciple complained “Master, we are not supposed to touch a woman, but you carried her in your arms, you tell us to not even think of women but you touched her” .

Monk smiled and said “I carried her across the river and left her on the other side, but you still seem to be carrying her”

This story has resonated in me since then. The takeaway message here is that, don’t waste time on thinking about past. Learn from the past and move on. However, I do agree it’s difficult to do that but, there are certain ways that have helped me to become more mindful and take rational decisions. Here’s a link to a video which you might find helpful : How to develop unwavering focus.

Why do we procrastinate? I’ll tell you… later.

Shitty jokes aside, have you ever wondered why sometimes you feel like It’s a good time to sleep when it’s raining cats and dogs outside? Well it’s an evolutionary trait, cavemen who preferred to stay inside during such a calamity survived, but now times have changed so much and so fast that although humanity has set its feet on moon , its primal instincts still persist .We would rather eat that brownie than complete the assignment. What we tend to ignore is that we went form being an instinct driven creature to rational humans but, we’re still bound by our instincts. When we were hunter gatherers muscle power ,instincts and adrenaline mattered the most, but now what matters is how you control your instincts. You might fall prey to natural selection if you now have the same traits as hunter gatherers(so scary if you think of it). The trend nowadays is survival of the smartest.

Procrastination is choosing want over what you actually need. If you are given 3 weeks to complete an assignment, you will most likely ‘plan’ to start working on it from 2nd week onwards and might dedicate the first week for fun activities.On the other hand, if I were to offer you 10000 bucks right now or 10050 bucks after two weeks, you’re more likely to choose the former option. See that? Later is an obscure place where anything can happen. You’re as bad as astrologers to predict future (believe in them? Oops). You suck at predicting your future mental states. Do it now. What makes you choose food over work? What makes smoking and drinking addictive? Dopamine is the answer.

Every-time you feel happy or excited, it’s because of that dopamine surge in brain. It’s a reward mechanism to encourage you to do more of it. Drugs give you happiness (dopamine surge) but all you do to gain that dopamine surge is just use them. They’re shortcuts to the prize that don’t actually have any value. In an experiment conducted to assess the addiction potential of cocaine and it’s outcomes, Rats chose cocaine over food(except Oreos and I’m not even kidding) all the time and died eventually. This is what happens to you when you are supplied with unlimited dopamine surge and that is why you need ups(rewards) and downs (pain of discipline)in life.

So, what are you going to do now? Move on to the next post? Grab a Beer?

Stop,take a deep breath.Focus.

Act.