Beginnings, Endings, and Goal formation.
The fanciest place I remember going to eat was in Chicago, USA at a place called The Girl and Goat. Paid $50 for a meal! But I had a really good meal – the whole shebang, appetiser, main course and dessert all on my own. But as with all food, digestion does its thing and the end result was a brown, brick flushed down a porcelain throne, very much like the time when I had cheaper meals anywhere else like every other day. We make decisions every day and with every decision there are consequences. When we eat, we will poo. When we don’t eat, we won’t poo. It would be silly and stupid to wish and want to eat and not expect poo. It is silly and stupid to live life and not accept the fact that with every action or inaction and speech or lack of it, a decision is made, and attached to them are their consequences. While it is important to acknowledge this reality, we don’t really dwell on the consequences, because as established in the earlier lesson, poo happens. And now that we have accepted it, lets put it to the side and come back to it in a bit. What is more important is the goal.
Would you like to stop your hunger or would you like to satisfy all your senses while you eat? Each different goal will determine at least 4 different qualities: the input required to fulfil the goal, the consequences attached to achieving the goal, the greater purpose, and the detailed specifications. If your goal is not to be hungry, the greater purpose could be to survive or lose weight, which will have an effect on what you input. If the goal is not to be hungry, then whatever you eat must be a small portion, because one doesn’t need much to stop hunger. However you might need to be quite specific about your goal – how long do you not want to be hungry? 5 minutes, 4 hours, 6 hours, or 12 hours? The longer the periods between hunger sessions, the ‘heavier’ each meal should be to last you. So you may need a high protein diet. But the consequence of high protein diet is to risk constipation, so to avoid that you may need to add vegetables to the diet and consume a lot of fluids during the day. The consequence could be that you may lose weight, but you may feel tired during the day which could have an effect on your output on other things. Are you willing to accept these consequences? What is interesting is that you may not really be bothered what you eat (the input), as long as it fulfils your goal and you can deal with the consequences.
On the other hand, you may want to fulfil your appetite with luxury maybe to fulfil your self-proclaimed title as ‘foodie’. So input matters. What you eat matters. So breakfast will have its own customs, as would lunch and dinner. Each meal will be cooked in a certain way to entice your palette. Each day will bring a different specification. Today could be Chinese, tomorrow Indian, the day after, who knows? But do you want to go out and eat or will you cook it yourself? So for your input, do you have to go shopping for ingredients, or do you have to search for cafes and restaurants? Being a ‘foodie’ is an expensive lifestyle, and can make you fat. Are you willing to deal with these consequences?
Underneath this process lies a deeper question, what is actually good for me? What is good for my body and what is good for my soul or in mud-dusters language, the essence of me? Is what I input ethical and healthy? Is my greater purpose ethical and healthy? Is the goal and are the consequences of ethical, moral and healthy? When I specify, do I do it with ethics, morality and health in mind? At the very least, do I intend to do good? The Arab scholar, ibn-Atallah Al-Iskandari writes in his book of wisdom, ‘If there is no sunrise in the beginning, there will be no sunrise in the end.’ How you begin a process, how you view your goal, and what you hope to achieve will allow you to not only have a good poo (the immediate outcome), but you will become healthier because of the process, and ultimately be content with yourself and with the blessings that you have. Good beginnings attached to good processes eventually lead to good ends. There’s an idea that gets thrown around and also practised, ‘ends justify the means.’ Do us all a favour and flush this notion down the gutter where it came from.
Your Poo-spective
Did anything change after reading this post?
What did it make you think?
How did it make you feel?
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The Immediate Flush
Do you have goals?
How do you know your goals are worthy?
Do you know what the consequences are of your goals?
Do you know what needs to be put in to make your goals happen?
Sometimes it takes more than water to deal with your issues.
Sometimes help is needed
And those who seek it are stronger
than those who don’t.
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