I’ve been inside the last couple of days, just turning my brain off and digesting thousands of images and bits of information from the internet, as I sometimes do. I guess it isn’t normal behavior, here at least, to sleep through classes and stop caring about assignments, but I sometimes do this. I think the reason is that the mind sometimes needs a break. We’re thinking all the time, even when we’re entertaining ourselves with movies and books, we can’t help but process them and spawn millions of thoughts from them. So when my brain needs a break, it tells my body.
Something that I find strange is how my body needs food and grows, i.e. the hair, nails. These things require constant upkeep, keeping fit, eating, and I can tell what mood I’m in when I observe my attitude towards activities like doing my nails. Why isn’t the human body static? In the future maybe we’ll be able to control this. One day all that growth will grind to a halt. (Is that what worries people about apathetic behavior like mine, that it’s a conscious foreshadowing?)
Sleep takes so much time as well. One thing I know about myself that is also true of many other people, is that I have high mental inertia (and probably physical inertia too considering my diet lately). This means that once I’m doing something, it takes, I think, 20x more energy for me to stop doing that thing than any regular person. A lot of this must be health related, I think, like I’m not eating the right foods that would energize me. On the other hand, I’ve heard that willpower is like a muscle that has to be exercised. [Side note: I googled "mental inertia" to see if it's a real thing, and it's supposedly similar to a mindset, and there are all these tips on overcoming your mental inertia, including those below that I found here on this self-improvement blog.]
When I dance I want to dance forever, I don’t stop unless someone turns off the music or stabs me (or grinds up against me, in which case I punch those people. That’s the way I dance, guys!!). When I sleep, I’m gone: my dreams are so much more interesting than the reality of this college campus, I have adventures and hop across continents, every scene has a palpable and concentrated tone, scents, vibrant colors, textures. When I write I can’t stop editing.
I …… can’t remember what I was just saying. or what I wanted to write about in the first place. People keep coming in to talk to me. Dammit people!
{ ways to overcome Mental Inertia }
- Mentally see the result of your action and picture the excellent result (this will motivate you into action),
- Start moving physically, and the brain will follow suit,
- Start small and pause to see actual result from this small step,
- When the mode is up, do not stop till you are satisfied,
- Rest when you feel tired ( otherwise you will feel stress up and anxiety will creep in),
- Think positively,
- Be aware that nothing is lost when you “actioned”; staying put causes more harm, and
- Believe in yourself; “I can do it” mentality.
