OUT OF THE BOX

June 09, 2019

7 am- the alarm rings.
7.30 am- final alarm snooze.
8.30 am- breakfast.
10 am- office.
This routine may sound quite familiar to most of you- maybe with slight changes in the time slots. Of course, we all have to work through every stage of life and falling into a routine is one of the best ways to have things sorted. Discipline is a virtue- waking up at a fixed time, organizing your tasks for the day, allocating time to each of your goals, staying away from junk food and other bad stuff- these rules are really needed. Had these boundaries not been there, we would all be in a crisis, isn’t it? Yet, today I’ll be sharing my thoughts on-
The Downside of Routines!

LIVING IN A BOX

Before my trail of thoughts on living a routine life begins, here are some incidences that I would like to share:

· The other day my gang of girlies asked one of our friends to turn up for a late evening walk by the lake and she refused because- she had “office next morning as usual”.

· A fitness freak at the gym was narrating his holiday moments and proudly exclaimed about not trying out the most famous delicacy of that place because he was on a ‘strict diet’.

· A cricket fan cancelled a family outing because he ‘never misses India’s batting’.

If you just read the underlined words above, nothing will seem out of place- we all have some or the other ‘fixed activities’ that we never want to give up. But if you read each of the sentences completely and understand the context in which they were said, you’ll see these behaviours in a totally different perspective. Sometimes, we tend to get so immersed in a fixed chain of activities or tightly held goals, we get locked up in an invisible box; cutting-off from a lot of good things that come our way!

Routines are Necessary- Boxes are not!

As time passes, we just get used to a particular way of doing things, creating comfort zones. Change is the thing that most of us shy away from- of course for a number of different reasons. I won’t say that routines are bad- they are in fact necessary! I myself advocate discipline- if you’ve been following my instagram stories regularly you’ll be aware of my early morning workouts and weekend creative work. But I feel that no routine should bind us to an extent that we miss out on things that turn up once in a while. So yes, I do skip my gym sessions during festivals or any other social events. I also avoid workouts when I feel really exhausted (not lazy). So my fitness goals and other goals too are definitely a priority, they can never and should never be over-binding!

The Key is- You

“I have to wake up early”
“I cannot eat this”
“My goals do not permit that”
Are these course of actions externally dictated, or are they voluntary acts? If you closely look at the list of things that you “cannot do” you will realize that most of those actions are overpowering priorities- innate to your own thought processes. Helplessness in most cases is just a game played by the mind. Rules can never be above you own willingness! So go ahead and
have your favourite cake,
stay back for some more chat with your friends,
switch off that alarm and complete your sleep hours
and BREAK EVERY RULE THAT TRIES TO RULE YOU!