We have all heard this definition of insanity: Doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results.
Lately I have thought about another one: resisting something which we know will make us feel better.
The immediate example in my life is going to the gym. Every time I go to the gym, I feel better. I have more energy, I am more mentally alert, plus I have the satisfaction of knowing I have done something good for my health. And I know that I have overcome this version of insanity: that in spite of the fact I always feel better at the gym and after, when it’s time to go I never want to go! It’s odd that I have to convince myself to go, but that’s just how it is.
One way of approaching this is through the multiple-selves model. Pre-gym me hates the gym, post-gym me loves it. “I” am the current state of conversation and negotiation between these two selves. I often joke (but not really) about evening me and morning me. Evening me thinks getting up early tomorrow and going for a walk sounds like a great idea. Morning me never wants to go do it – even though every time I can remember being outside early in the morning, I thought, “This is so nice being out here in the early morning. I should do this more often.”
“Should” is a tricky word there, because I am not arguing that a person “should” get up early, go to the gym, meditate, or whatever. I am only saying that virtually every time I do any of those things, I am glad I did it. These things make me feel better. And, almost without variation, when the next opportunity to do them arises, I don’t want to do it. But it’s always “me” making the decision.
Is this insanity? Or is insanity thinking that there is just one “me” that needs to figure this out?
Maybe the really crazy or delusional thing is thinking I am a unified person, entity or being, with one set of desires – or worse, that I “should” be such a unified being. I am not, and I never have been.
Maybe the path to sanity is just accepting it all, letting go of the shoulds, and knowing that this “dis”unity is, in fact, the unified “me.”
Accept it all, as it is, and be it all.
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