Warning: this article contains information that can challenge your twenty-first century norms.
The whole body was formed to serve one purpose: surviving. We have certain physical features that keep us alive, but what about the mental part? Fear is a big thing keeping the human race alive.
Nowadays, speaking more than three languages, memorizing ten chapters the night before tests, and multitasking with anything are the new need for basic human survival.
I don’t think it’s hard on our brains to adapt and start evolving to meet all of these survival needs, but can that be what brings inner peace to any of us?
I think our generation’s curse is too much information. I never thought of knowledge as a curse until I realized how much information my brain has to process every second. Color, sound, word, facts, posts, quotes, etc. is information that is stored in the brain just the same way our devices store information.
Unfortunately, we can not pay Apple $1 every month to make more space in our heads for us to store more information. What we can do to create more space is to try for a few minutes to limit the information that our brains need to process.
How? Just pause. I know it sounds impossible because you still have to turn in that assignment and go to that meeting in a few minutes, then you have to practice, and there are a zillion other things you have to do.
Well, what are you doing all of that for? The answer will surely be: to be happy! I can promise that you will not be happy with having a dysfunctional brain and possibly a dysfunctional body, as well.
You do not need to do an hour of boring meditation or to become Buddhist. You just need to turn all the notifications off, close your eyes, feel your body, take a deep breath, and know you are more important than all of the to-do lists.
Keep your brain with a lot of space in it because you are going to live for so long and see many amazing things to store. Stop clicking “save” on everything; give your brain space to breathe. That’s the difference between us and nonliving things: we can pause and breathe.
