Here is what a soda fountain looks like to me:
Maybe "poison" is too strong. Then again, most soft drinks make you weaker and sicker, with no health benefits; I'm not sure of a better word. Maybe a big "X" would have sufficed. Either way, I am not a soda drinker, largely for health reasons. When I realized that what I see when I look at a soda fountain is not what others see, I was shocked and started wondering about the distortions other people have on the world. I used to just assume we all saw the same things, and now I'm convinced we don't.
Though we differ, everyone has shorthands for maneuvering through the world, decisions made in advance to save time and energy. The legal term for one of these is "bright-line," which Merriam-Webster defines as, "providing an unambiguous criterion or guideline." They can be tremendously useful. Good habits can do a lot to make life easier and better. Routines are good for mental health and general productivity. In his Psychology: Briefer Course, William James writes, "There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision, and for whom the lighting of every cigar, the drinking of every cup, the time of rising and going to bed every day, and the beginning of every bit of work, are subjects of express volitional deliberation. Full half of the time of such a man goes to the deciding, or regretting, of matters which ought to be so ingrained in him as practically not to exist for his consciousness at all."
When I hear, "as practically not to exist for his consciousness at all," I think of advertisements. For some reason, marketers count on the fact that you'll pay attention to their ad. If you don't read it, it doesn't matter how genius-inspired the wording or picture is. So common is ignoring ads that the term "banner blindness" sprang up to describe a person's tendency to completely ignore anything that looks like an advertisement while online. Sometimes viewers even skip over a legitimate part of a website because its design looks too much like an ad. I think going blind to ads is a fabulous practice. Paying attention to advertisements is inviting yourself to feel discontented. Plus, I can't imagine the extra bother I'd have in my life if every time, say, Time Warner mailed me something, I had to sit down and deliberate the pros and cons of having cable. It makes me glad we had the cables ripped out of the apartment when we moved in. Decision: made. It's annoying enough to transport the mailers from the mailbox to the recycle bin; I don't need the hassle of reading them every week.
I like making guidelines for myself to save the time and energy spent deliberating. I have been through several iterations of this with food. "Categorically, I do not purchase baked goods at a gas station," is an old, reliable one. I'm happy with where I've landed, not that I always follow through. My eating guidelines can go out the window when free cheesecake is involved.
Of course, guidelines are always only as good as the legitimacy of the beliefs they're based on. In a way, it's uncomfortable for me to have changed my mind so many times about food, but on the other hand, I do consider my changes to be improvements. Generally, I want to make sure that my short-cuts are helping me and not hurting me. I don't want to block out a whole viewpoint just because it isn't what I expect to hear or because it's presented in such a way that it doesn't make it past my filter.
Despite its risks, this "categorical" approach has brought a lot of peace and clarity to my life. There are so many things demanding a person's attention nowadays. At any moment, a friend could reach out through texting, Snapchat, email, Facebook, Instagram, or another channel. Then there's the never-ending stream of internet articles. I daily receive more promotional emails than I am able to read, though I fight back by unsubscribing from lists as often as I dare. To keep from feeling overwhelmed, I have to make big decisions about what is important to me. It's essential to be willing to risk missing out on something and not try to "do it all." Only by categorically ruling things out can I have any measure of rest. Determining what matters and letting go of what doesn't is a challenge, but it feels so good to progress. I've found the fewer clothes I own, the more I enjoy the ones I have. It's the same with emails; the fewer I have assaulting my inbox, the better I can engage with what comes in. I've never regretted not reading all the labels on a soda fountain. I have better things to read with my 24 hours in a day.
How do you use habits and mental shortcuts to make your life better?
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