Slow down the pace!

We are living in a highly competitive world and we have no time to waste in achieving our desired goals. We have to keep to deadlines, travel fast, eat fast and live fast.

We are too busy to spend some time with our loved ones. The little time we have after a hectic day's work is spent before the idiot box. When we reach our middle age we are struck down by coronary heart attack or high blood pressure. And then it is too late to change our lifestyle.

In the developed world heart disease is more prevalent than in the Third World. That is what medical experts say. Even in a country like Sri Lanka which is a developing country heart disease is on the increase. This is not mainly due to drinking, smoking or lack of exercise. It is solely due to the hectic race we are running.

Think of our ancestors. They did not take regular exercise at the gymnasium. Some of them drank toddy or some other home-made brew. They also smoked and chewed betel. With all such vice they lived long without suffering from any heart attacks.

The secret of their longevity is that they led a relaxed lifestyle. For them there was no frenzy of living. As there were no modern communication methods they walked miles and miles to meet their relations and friends. They spent long hours talking to them or playing various games. Thus they led a life of leisure and extended their lifespan by many years.

Dr. Meyer Friedman who conducted an extensive research into the causes of coronary heart diseases in the United States of America says, "Whenever a man struggles too incessantly to accomplish too many things in too little time, whenever he struggles too competitively with other individuals, this struggle markedly accentuates the course of coronary heart disease."

According to him, the biochemical forces generated by this internal unrest are capable of bringing on cardiac arrest. He says that unrest elevates blood cholesterol and destroys normal reserves of life sustaining hormones.

Human body is like a machine. Nobody can use it 24 hours a day without taking a rest. However, what happens most of the time is that we try to use our body and brain for more than 10-15 hours a day. As a result, we find that we have no time to relax or to play with our children and pets.

When you go on working at this hectic pace, your body is likely to break down and you may have to seek medical advice for cardiac problems.

If somebody asks you to slow down your pace, you will say that it is a difficult proposition. First of all, our life on this planet is relatively short. After 13 years of schooling we have to follow a university or some other professional course.

Then we have to find a job. This is followed by marriage and children. You have to earn a lot to put up a house, send your children to reputed schools and buy a vehicle. "How can I do all these tasks without money? That is the question you are going to ask me.

I agree that you have to earn money to lead a successful life. However, if you are going to overwork, you will be shortening your lifespan. Most so-called busy people are running against time.

They cling on to jampacked buses and trains to reach their workplaces on time. Any delay on their part would be a pay-cut or disciplinary proceedings. So they do not travel leisurely to work places but run a race early in the morning.

The pressure in certain jobs is unbearable. Employees have to meet deadlines and targets. Sometimes they skip breakfast and have a hurried lunch paying no attention to their health.

After work most of these employees return home fully exhausted. Some of them take liquor to sooth their tired nerves. Others run to the gymnasium or watch television. Still others take office work home and hasten their race to death.

You might argue that anybody can pinpoint these matters. But is there a way out? As it is, getting out of this vicious circle is not easy. However, you can pause for a moment and ask yourself; Am I accelerating my death? Who will attend my funeral? Answers to these questions will put you on the right track.

Think of your partner and children. What will happen to them if you die prematurely? You may have amassed a fortune. However, wealth will not save your life if you are struck down by illness.

The other day I was standing in a long queue at the bank. Some well-dressed important people were getting restless. They were cursing the officer manning the counter. "Why can't he do his job quickly? We are busy people," they seemed to say.

When once they walk out of the bank, they are no longer in a hurry to go home or to return to their work places. So this display of self importance appears to be a social malaise.

If you are compelled to stand in a long queue, try to relax. Look at the beauty bubbling around you. Study the body language of the people. Listen to the soft music. Do not lose your cool under any circumstances. If you lose your temper, you will become a laughing stock. All the eyes will be riveted on you. If you try to be arrogant and start shouting, you might get even a heart attack.

In order to relax you do not have to go to the nearest club and gulp down a tot of whisky. If you find your wife and children glued to the television, try to have a conversation with your cat as Hilaire Belloc once did. In a beautifully written essay Belloc says how he had a conversation with a cat. One day he went to the bar of a railway station to have a glass of beer. While sipping his beer he started meditating on "the necessary but tragic isolation of the human soul."

While he was lost in his thoughts, "fate or some fostering star" sent him "a tawny, silky, long-haired cat."-

Then he asked the cat why it singled him out to show its favours. Instead of answering his question, the cat gave out a loud purring noise and expressed its delight "with closed eyes of ecstasy."

Belloc continued the conversation and the cat encouraged him to do so with its gestures. Then he ends his essay by saying, "For there is not a man living who knows better than I that the four charms of a cat lie in its closed eyes, its long and lovely hair, its silence and even its affected love."

Hilaire Belloc, the English writer born in France, was the author of "Danton" and "Robespierre". He reinterpreted history in "History of England." He lived for 83 years. I have seen many villagers having a conversation with their cats and dogs. But those sophisticated people living in the city may not want to follow their country cousins.

Those who cannot converse with their cats and dogs or have regular outings should try to spend at least one day a month doing nothing. The reputed author, J.B. Priestley, tells us how he spent a day or two on a moor just doing nothing.

He had no plans for the day but he enjoyed himself doing nothing while he and his like-minded friend were doing nothing on the moor, their relations and friends "were humming and bustling, shaping and contriving, planning, disputing, getting and spending.

"But they were as gods, solidly occupied in doing nothing." However, when the due returned to the world of men, they were denounced as "idlers." No wonder, J.B. Priestley lived for 100 years. He was a newspaper essayist who wrote on a wide variety of subjects.

Those who keep themselves busy all the time should remember that the devil is the busiest creature in the universe. However, nobody has a good word for him. So, why should we follow the devil when we can be happier doing our work in a relaxed pace?

If you still cannot make up your mind to relax, you should climb a hill and lie flat on it gazing at the beautiful clouds floating in the sky. Then you will regain your mental health!

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