Brain Food #746
To go in the direction of the water
Thoughts of the day
An article published in Forbes in 2018 claimed that over 90% of the world’s data had been created over the past two years. Time is not only appearing to be more scarce, but 2021 also happened to be the shortest year in decades. The information age and the attention economy combine to send a flood of cognitive stimuli our way on a daily basis.
If you are finding it hard to keep up with what is happening in the world, the latest trends or news, you are not alone. British physicist Geoffrey West identified our life’s challenge as finding a way to cope with the psychological turmoil that frequent, rapid change might bring:
“Rather than being bored to death, our actual challenge is to avoid anxiety attacks, psychotic breakdowns, heart attacks, and strokes resulting from being accelerated to death.”
But change is not a new phenomenon. Centuries ago, close to 500BC, Heraclitus famously said ‘panta rhei’, or everything flows. Change is the only constant in life.
And so, the best strategy to deal with change may not be resistance, but acceptance, whether that change is coming from within or without. As Benjamin Franklin said, “When you are finished changing, you are finished.” Artists often change their styles, exploring new directions. Picasso and Matisse went from representational art to modernist and abstract pieces.
In the stream of life, it might make much more sense to go in the direction of the water, but also to remember that, at the end of the day, the only thing we have to keep up with is ourselves.
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