Reasons Are Bullshit!

"The problem with reasons 

is that they’re just  

excuses prettied up."

I always used to be late to the board meeting of Working Machines, a corporation located in Berkeley, an hour from where I live. Invariably, after a frantic hour of aggressive and dangerous driving, I would arrive with an apology, explaining that the highway was unusually congested. The board chairman always graciously assured me that the main thing was that I had arrived safely. Still, I had held things up, and the other board members, who had arrived on time, were clearly not thrilled. Deep down I knew that the highway traffic was not the real issue.

Yes, the traffic on highway 880 was often heavier than I had hoped it would be, and the traffic getting out of Palo Alto and into Berkeley was excruciatingly slow. Yet how unusual was heavy midday traffic, really? I merely failed to allow enough time. I tried to leave earlier. Yet I would always squeeze in a few last-minute e-mails and phone calls. Then, after leaving my office, I would see a colleague at the elevator and get caught up in a discussion.

It all came down to this: I did not see the meeting as a high priority in my life. It was that simple. It had nothing to do with the traffic. Although there were no negative business consequences, it was bad for my self-esteem: I felt guilty for always being late. I didn’t like how it felt to have all eyes on me for the wrong reason when I walked into the room. I gave it some thought and realized that there were other people in that room facing the same traffic and the same “life happens” stuff that I was, yet they managed to be there before me because they cared enough to do so.

Once I had that insight, I decided that from then on I would give the meeting the priority it deserved. Thereafter, I gave the meeting the attention it required and left early enough to get there on time. No more last-minute e-mails or phone calls, no cutting it close. I stopped waiting until the last minute, and decided that it was worth it to stop everything else early and get in the car ten minutes before I “had to.”

If I was lucky, and the traffic was very light, I had time to enjoy a little of the Berkeley scene before I went into the meeting. If traffic was normal, I was a little early and could schmooze with some of the other board members. If traffic was really ugly, I was just on time. The positive effects of eliminating the stress associated with getting to the meetings on time were life-changing.

And it didn’t end there. I began to change my attitude toward time overall. I used to be late to most things in my life. Now I am known as the pain in the ass who is always on time and expects others to be. I make it a point to start every class and every workshop session on time. It turns out that my life works better when I do not need to come up with reasons for why I am late.

"Our society loves reasons. Perhaps the illusions

that there is a single known reason

for each thing we do is comforting."

Reasons are bullshit. I know it sounds harsh, however, it’s a good categorical stand to take, as you’ll see. Reasons exist because if people didn’t explain their behavior, they would seem unreasonable. So we are faced with a paradox: we need reasons so we appear reasonable, yet when we use reasons we are not taking full responsibility for our behavior.

Let’s say I walk up to a stranger and punch him in the face. He’ll ask why I did that. If I say, “For no reason,” I am clearly unreasonable. If instead I say he reminds me of the man who abused my sister, I am now a (somewhat) reasonable person.

Reasons are often just excuses, however. We use them to hide our shortcomings from ourselves. When we stop using reasons to justify ourselves, we increase our chances of changing behavior, gaining a realistic self-image, and living a more satisfying and productive life.

Many reasons are simply excuses to hide the fact that we are not willing to give something a high enough priority in our lives. For example, a student might come into my class late, saying, “I’m sorry I’m late. I got a flat on my bicycle.” Even if it is true that her bicycle has a flat tire, the bottom line is, getting to class on time is not a high enough priority in her life. If I had a rule that any student who came in late would fail the class, she would have made sure to be on time, flat tire or not. If the rule was you got expelled from school for a single lateness, she would have been there even earlier!

Right Or Wrong

In life we will often find ourselves playing the game of right and wrong. The rules seem quite simple: I win if I am right—and you are wrong.

I once had a heated disagreement with my wife, Ruth, about something silly just as I was leaving to walk over to my friend Doug’s house. As I was walking, I was consumed with thoughts of how right I was and how wrong she was. She was worse than wrong. She was downright pigheaded and stupid about it. I was consumed by such thoughts for about two blocks. And then I looked up.
 

It was a beautiful clear winter day, and the bare trees had a fantastic presence. I was awestruck. I felt a surge of wonderment and joy. Still consumed by my feelings about the argument, I shook my head and descended back into my self-righteous annoyance. I put my head down and kept walking and thinking about how stupid she was being. Then I looked up again, allowed myself to experience the wonderment, and again shut it down. I couldn’t seem to let my feelings go.

Finally enlightenment came. By continuing to play my solitaire hand of right and wrong, I was being downright pigheaded and stupid. The world was offering me a magic moment, and I was turning it down. With that realization I was able to laugh at my stupidity and enjoy the moment. I arrived at Doug’s house in a euphoric state. That incident took place over twenty years ago. I have no memory of what the argument was about, and each winter I again feel the wonder of that experience when I look up at the bare trees.

This whole situation is kind of like gambling in a card room. The room gets its percent off the top the minute you start to play each hand—it’s how it makes its money. Clearly, regardless of whether you win or lose specific hands, at the end of the night the players’ total worth will have been diminished—it is the price of playing. If I had continued playing the right and wrong game that day, I would have lost a peak experience, and the card room would have gotten much more from me than its usual fee.

Whenever I find myself challenged to a game of right and wrong, I stop playing. Next time you find yourself playing right and wrong, remember: You give everything in your life its meaning, so you can choose to end the game. It does not matter how right you are or how wrong they are; you lose just by playing.

SIMILARLY, YOU CAN MODIFY the way you react to experiences. One little trick is that by exaggerating your reaction, you can make the experience better. For example, if you are at a boring meeting, just tell yourself that it is the most boring meeting you have ever attended. It is in fact so boring that it is amazing. If you are depressed, do not get depressed at the idea of being depressed. Get off on it. Admire the fact that you are having this amazing depression.

It’s the opposite of wallowing; it’s allowing yourself to become amused by the terribleness of your situation. You know how some dogs are so ugly they’re cute? This is like that. Think of the metaphors a comedian would use to describe just how bad the meeting is. Write your troubles into a comedic country song. Deliver your own stand-up routine about depression.

It’s incredibly empowering to realize that you have the power to change your attitude toward anything. Do you hate washing dishes? If you think about it, there is a lot that is nice about washing dishes. Putting your hands into warm water is soothing. Rinsing and soaping can be a pleasure. And getting rid of a mess and admiring your clean kitchen is always satisfying. Try out a new attitude toward dish washing. You might just find enjoyment in it.

ONCE YOU LEARN THAT it is possible to change your habits and develop new attitudes about things, you have a new tool to use in both your professional and your personal life. For most people it is probably easier to change their attitude toward dishwashing than their attitude toward depression. Yet if you start with the small stuff, you will find it easier to tackle the harder stuff in life.

Use Your Brain

If you take time to be aware of your current mental state and then deliberately alter it, you can force your brain into more balanced activities. Eventually, this de-stressing becomes automatic.

Various types of dysfunctional behavior are associated with a lack of balance in the use of different parts of our brains. So, for example, pathological eating is associated with the reptilian part of your brain (the brain stem). Narcissistic or overly dramatic behavior is associated with being stuck in the emotional (limbic) part of the brain. Overintellectualization is associated with being stuck in the part associated with higher intellectual functions (the neocortex).

We can stop ourselves from getting stuck by practicing self-awareness. In this way we can train our brains to give us greater sensory awareness, body awareness, and social awareness. This is generally referred to as mind over matter, the main principle behind cognitive behavioral therapy, a school of psychology that believes if we can change our thinking, we can change our behavior. Though it doesn’t always work for everyone, it’s a method I encourage. No matter what got you to the state you’re in, consciously changing the way you think about it can help solve the problem.

YOUR TURN

Who am I? What do I want? What is my purpose? Ask yourself each of these questions repeatedly and respond with whatever comes to mind.

You can write out your answers in a journal or notebook, or just say them to yourself. Don’t overthink; just answer the questions. It’s okay to repeat yourself, and it’s okay to say things that don’t make a lot of sense. Each question should be repeated for at least five or ten minutes. If you have someone available to work with, you can take turns where one person repeatedly asks the same question and the other person answers. Of course, if there are two people, the questions need to be rephrased: “Who are you?” “What do you want?” “What is your purpose?” (I might answer: I am a father, I am a husband; I want to finish my book, I want more time; my purpose is to teach, my purpose is to live. All of these are, for me, on a superficial level. Usually it takes a little while to come up with insightful rather than mundane answers. Do it! You might be surprised with what you come up with, and how it contributes to your achievement habit.)

The effect of this exercise is to get you to devote time to thinking deeply about the meaning of your life. What matters more than your specific answers is that you open yourself to these questions. Doing this exercise generally promotes relaxation, builds internal energy, and nurtures an increased sense of aliveness.

Similar benefits can be derived from other types of meditation. Experiment to see which works best for you. I rarely meditate in a formal manner; instead I do things that are meditative. I take walks. I ride my bike. I make time to be alone in nature when I need to quiet my mind. Another thing that works for some people is repetitive activities that require little focus. Knitting, crocheting, gardening, and doodling can all be meditative. Or make it even simpler! If you’re feeling scattered, you can just take a few minutes to be still and focus on your breathing. Be mindful of each breath: in and out, in and out. Try to make your exhalation last twice as long as your inhalation. Pay attention to a fixed object around you—books, a picture on the wall; don’t analyze, just ground yourself. Ultimately you will benefit from increased concentration, decreased anxiety, and a general feeling of happiness.

Who controls your brain?

We generally like to think we are in charge of our actions. Society has a stake in us believing that, or there would be no way to justify restraining and punishing people with antisocial behaviors. Nevertheless, we know that some of the things we do are not controlled consciously. These are known as reflexive or autonomous behaviors.

It is easy to see these autonomous behaviors in other species. Some of these can be quite complex and are part of animals’ DNA. For example, the South African weaverbird normally builds an intricate nest using specialized materials. Experimenters removed a pair of these birds from contact with building materials and from other members of their species for five generations. The birds were not able to build, or even see, traditional nests. And yet when the sixth generation—still in isolation from its species—was given access to the traditional materials, it built a perfect nest. This may be an extreme example, yet it illustrates the point that even some complex behaviors may be reflexive and not quite under conscious control.

You see this at work when physical danger and emotional threats trigger our fight-or-flight response. By the time the signals get to the parts of our brains that can reason about them, our emotional and reflexive brain centers have already armed our bodies, and we are in action.

Although this quick gut-level response could be lifesaving, it may not be the appropriate response to perceived emotional threats in a psychologically complex world. Not all issues can be satisfactorily resolved by following our first reactions. Like when that jerk cuts you off by swerving into your lane at ninety miles an hour.

What happens when someone does something aggressive on the highway? Well, most people respond in exactly the wrong way. They decide to fight. They yell, curse, honk their horns, or even chase and attempt to confront the offending driver. Meanwhile, the best option for survival is flight. I have discussed this with people from many different backgrounds, and it always brings the same response. We all agree that if someone is driving aggressively or dangerously, the best thing to do is stay as far away as possible. Yet a lot of us admit to behaving in the opposite manner: we pursue the other car. Where does that come from? In this situation there are two options. The first is the initial knee-jerk reaction triggered by our brain, which is out of our conscious control. The second is our reasoned response, which can be brought under control.

The first reaction is often called a limbic-abduction reaction or an amygdala hijacking because it is triggered by the amygdala, a small organ within the brain’s limbic system. The amygdala’s primary function is to immediately signal the adrenal glands when a fear stimulus is received. It has a secondary—and slower—connection to the cortex and the other reasoning centers of the brain.

It is important to realize that the secondary “reasoned” reaction is not a voluntary one. Many of us just follow what we have seen our friends and family do, and that can brainwash us into thinking that dysfunctional behavior is the normal or honorable thing. With a bit of effort you can easily change your secondary reaction. All you have to do is decide you want to change, and then work on it. If you are willing to ignore the initial limbic impulse, you can get your cortex to calm down, take charge, and calm your whole body down.

Admittedly, some people have to work harder at controlling themselves than others. It does not matter if you’re a hothead by nature or nurture (or both), you can learn to control your secondary reaction, and it’s important to do this, so you don’t end up blowing up at people. Some powerful people—politicians, actors, singers, CEOs, even a book publisher—have ruined their careers because they didn’t get their limbic impulses under control. Momentary temper flare-ups can cost you everything.

There are four-step process to handle situations in which we are in the thrall of a limbic abduction:

• Stop yourself from doing what your initial reaction dictated.

• Take a deep breath.

• Become aware of how you are feeling.

• Recall a past event that gave you a feeling of happiness and peace.

In terms of design thinking, you’re breaking down the fight response and looking at it as a problem to be solved, then using ideation to bring you to a better place. These steps bring you into a state of emotional well-being, in which you regain control over your behavior.

In most cases you only need to take the first three steps to get the situation under control. It takes practice, and if you keep at it every time a negative behavior presents itself, it eventually becomes easier and easier to gain control and stop doing it. In any event, taking a deep breath in any situation never hurts.

The Familiar Unfamiliar

To forge a new attitude toward the events and relationships in your life, you must learn to look at them with a fresh perspective. It's a common practice during creativity seminars to give participants a bag full of materials and tools and then a problem to solve. The materials and tools are usually everyday items. You are then to use those materials in whatever ways you want to solve the problem; however, there isn't usually an obvious connection between the items and your problem. For instance maybe you have to figure out how to create a communication device using a box full of Cheerios, a hammer, tape, cotton balls, a hairbrush and a bag of marbles.

Most people have a cognitive bias called functional fixedness that causes them to see objects only in their normal context. The use of the materials and tools in their ordinary way will generally lead to no workable solutions or, at the very most, mundane ones. The really exciting solutions come from overcoming functional fixedness and using these everyday items in new ways. To see the possibilities it is helpful to take the viewpoint that nothing is what you think it is. You need to make the familiar unfamiliar.
  
So, for example, a box of Cheerios is no longer only a breakfast cereal. It can be broken down into cardboard and wax paper. It is a source of biomass or a source of small chips and grains. It also can be made into a sludgy mixture. Similarly, a hammer is a weight, a source of metal and wood, and it can act as mandrel, a seesaw, or a pendulum. Tape can be used to hold things together, and it also can be made into its own structural element in any desired shape. There are a number of creative ways you might use these items to fulfill the assignment.

The same dynamic can be applied to ourselves. Just as things in the material world can be transformed from their common use into something different, so too can behavior and relationships. It's difficult at first to break through preconceived notions, however once you do it, you'll find it opens the world up to you. Stop labeling things in their usual way. Mike (any student) is not a failure because his class project failed. You are not a loser because you lost your job. Make the familiar into the unfamiliar, and the result can be amazing and delightful, as opposed to dull, nonfunctional, and ordinary.

You can remove labels entirely; you can also relabel to great effect. Recent studies reinforce the idea that relabeling can change behavior. Experiments have found statistical evidence that, for instance, if you ask people to be voters, you get more voter turnout than if you simply ask people to vote. Similarly, if you ask people not to be cheaters there is less cheating than if you just ask people not to cheat. The inference is that people are more concerned with reinforcing their self-image that with their actions; thus, to change behavior, you first change self-image.

We all have ideas in our minds of what and who we our. We may have an accurate self-image, or it may be way off. Either way, it strongly colors how we respond to the world around us.

The Meaning Of Achievement

At the risk of sounding immodest, I've won a lot of awards. I have drawers filled with them. They are nice to receive and sometimes the dinners are fun. However, the next morning when I wake up and look at them - the glass paperweight, the certificates - they don't really mean anything.

So it is with many of the hallmarks of  "achievement" as people usually use the word. Getting on the honor roll, getting a high paying job, being salesman of the month, getting the corner office, getting a company car, getting interviewed by the media, winning awards: this is what most people think of when they think of achievement. To me all this mises the mark.

Each of those things can be genuine achievement - something that means something to you for more  than a day - or each could just a badge of importance that you use to show people that you are somebody. Do those things make you happy in and of themselves?

I know mega -millionaires who are miserable. They spend their money getting the fat sucked out of their love handles and hiring bodyguards because they're paranoid (maybe rightfully so) that people are out to get them. They're always concerned with outdoing themselves and making the next million and the next - and for what? Conversely, I know artists who barely scrape by yet are happy and fulfilled. Neither is a sure path to happiness or enlightenment; you can surely be rich and happy, but one doesn't necessarily follow the other.

Achievement for achievement's sake, then, is pretty hollow. It's the endless pursuit of a carrot on a stick as you race around the track. For me, real achievement is traveling to a foreign country, learning some of the language, and finding my way around my own. Real achievement is learning to be self-sufficient. Real achievement is making lifelong friends. In my mind, I define achievement as having a good life; getting the job of living done in a satisfying way that nurtures the life force within us and within those we associate with. It entails developing some self-mastery to handle the difficult aspects of our lives and relationships. It involves finding something to do with our lives that engages us and gives us positive feedback. If we're doing it right, life shouldn't be a debilitating struggle, even if a times it takes considerable effort.

Sometimes we should learn from the small kids. I want to share a incident from where I learnt something. Actually I was watching a kabaddi match. After one half, the two teams started fighting because of referee's mistake. Everyone was asking for more run for their team. At the same time I looked up on the small kids. They were just marking the lines. So what was the curious thing I saw?

There were so many kids asking other kids to mark the line. You know what, I didn't see even a single kid trying to ditch another for taking his chance also. And there was no fight between them. On the contrary, those young people were fighting continuously and did not stop! So what is the learning?

Well you don't always have to think of your profit. Sometimes you can just try to live that moment happily. As those teams were fighting, they should have played for fun, not for the profit.

Why saying no is important.

Saying "no" is not necessary all the time. But sometimes there are situations, where you have to say no to somebody because your no can be favourable to all the people at that time. On the contrary, I agree that this may affect your relationships. But let me make you clear that your years relationships cannot be broken by a single no. And eventually you can also make them understand that why you said no to them.

  

SO BETTER TO SAY NO SOMETIMES 

It's true that saying sometimes no will hurt someone else's feelings - you may even disappoint someone you admire. But you are also fostering resentment and regret when you don't honor yourself and your needs. This leads you to be even more critical of yourself and spirals into negative self-talk which can leads to symptoms of anxiety and depression.

 

A friend of mine was a hockey player. He was in our school's hockey team. They had a very big match because all of the schools of our area were participating in that and he had a very big opportunity to change his life. Their coach even started their training six months before. Also he practiced every single day.

His team won all the matches till semi-finals and they were heading to the final match. But something bad happened to my friend before the match. As always he was doing practice with his team, but during practice he broke his knee and after that day they had a final match. Due to that injury, he was not able to play, but he was still pretending as like nothing happened to him.

His team took him to the doctor and the doctor said that he has to get one week bed rest. All that means, he had lost his one of the golden chance to play. Now their coach had to take the decision. And just like the doctor, he said no to my friend and replaced him with an another player. Due to this my friend cried all that day on bed.

Eventually as we all had guessed, their team lost the match. After knowing this he lost his temper and even didn't talk to anyone for one week. But after weeks, when my friend saw his medical report, he went straight to the coach and said thanks to him. And you know what was written on that report?

He would have lost his leg if he played the match because his knee injury was also affecting his leg and bed rest was must for him. So he thanked to his coach for not letting him to play in that match.

From this I realized that sometimes saying no is also important.

Things make us sad.

1. Always thinking about the future that what's going to happen and what will not.

2. Always recalling the past feelings and becoming sad about it.

       

But let me tell you that thinking about the past and the future is never going to make you happy because you are not able to hold them and live in it. But you have the present to live where you can do anything. And if you want to live the life just live in the present then see the difference.

3. Always worried about other people (what people will think) and always wasting your time in it.

Consequences (for example):
Not able to speak in front of people.
Not able to wear the cloths you want to wear.
Not able to focus on your work properly.

But let me tell you that you are just wasting your important time of your life in thinking about other's opinion. Their opinion and thinking about you will never change, so you just have to ignore that and live your life.

4. In today's time we people are also facing a problem of becoming rich so fast. Let me tell you how, you use social media like YouTube, watch a rich person's video and start cursing yourself for not having the luxurious things that he has. But you never see his past efforts or what kind of background he has (may be his background is rich). But if you want to be rich, you have to work.

5. Most of the people don't work and become sad because they think, they are not having enough money, resources and also they are not lucky. But the truth is, you will not be successful until you do work hard. In today's time, you have a big power which is internet from where you can do anything (means learning), so use that power in the right way.

Some of the people might say that they have seen some successful people who have not done any hard work, instead they were having some birth specialty and  good IQ than us. But let me tell you:

YOUR I CAN,
YOUR WORK
IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN
YOUR IQ

6. Some people do not have good relations and they feel very sad about it. Let me tell you the reason for not having good relations.

    YOU ALWAYS EXPECT GOOD

   FROM OTHER PEOPLE

                   
You always want people to work according to you, but that will never going to happen. As soon as you start expecting from other people, you are becoming more sad and frustrated. If you don't want to obey other's made rules then why are you expecting from them to obey yours.