Precautionary Measures, Pattern Recognition

(Note: This was originally posted in my Facebook's Slate)

This thought ran in my head during the time I was in the middle of my recent adventures: how come I keep slipping and seem to meet small accidents? How come years ago I would just take a step on a boulder, on a patch of grass, foot into a running stream, and did not even experience slipping or losing my balance? Does age have anything to do with it or did my hesitation take away my concentration? Or too much concentration --- thinking --- led to my hesitation?

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I was in Camiguin about a few months ago and almost slipped on boulders while canyoning. I was also in Palaui Island in Cagayan Valley about a month ago and managed to slip on shallow streams. I have climbed the second highest mountain in the country, and probably a significant portion of the climbing I had to use my butt and crawled my way up on a horizontal trail. During my spelunking adventure in Sagada I also almost fell into a hole that would lead to the unknown when, again, I lost my balance on a slippery limestone.

I am not sure if those were just signs that I have become accident prone over the years, but really, why do these things happen when I start to tell myself, "DO NOT SLIP!!!"

I started this mental dialogue in some mountain in Camiguin leading to the Katibawasan Waterfalls and confronted myself that I was not like this years ago. Years ago there was so much trust in my every step: cross a river, hop on a series of rock formations, my feet grabbing the earth with no fail. There was no fear. I trusted the elements around me, and if I fell, I did not have to think of the fall, I got up and moved on. This time --- with life experiences somehow concocting a mixture of conflicting knowledge not necessarily leading to useful personal wisdom --- I would think of every step, tell myself not to fail, and if I did, I would think about it and strategize.

I hate to say this, but what's happened to me? I have written articles on strategic planning and I have read materials on risk management --- how come if I applied them in my life I seem to always end up on my ass? How come the anticipation leads to the manifestation? Is this proof that "The Secret", which I have seen out of curiousity, is actually true (tee-hee)?

I read somewhere --- in an Oprah magazine I guess, haha --- that people do not behave randomly but rather their behavior is based on what has always worked for them. For instance, some people may have seen that indifference work for them, so voila --- unless such inaction does not work for an important situation, they will continue to be indifferent. It 's like Darfur and Africa --- yes, I think I read this in an Oprah back issue I bought the other day --- the apathy that the world has shown may be due to this thing called psychic numbing. There's a difference between a tragedy and statistics. Put a face on an event and it matters, but if the numbers are brought in, it's just another headline, a fact. Such attitude towards things may be a means for people to keep from experiencing grief, which is why, I hate to say this, psychic numbing has worked for a lot of people.

I guess I like to think that psychic numbing is an innate precautionary function among humans. We tend to protect ourselves from getting hurt and find means to keep ourselves together. It may be an individual thing: people taking a more indifferent approach at life and putting less value in things that may hurt or fail them, or it can be collective, like religion. People find a fall back for the sum of all their fears. They arm themselves with knowledge and a certain attitude. Like my mom and superstitions --- she told me before it wouldn't hurt to believe them. Which is why I kept doing the sign of the cross every time I would take a bath, and I think it only stopped when I was thirteen when I thought, "What if I didn't this time?"

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I just did things without thinking too much about it. Ignore the hesitation. Hop lightly on rocks like Tolkien's elves. Frankly, it is easier to be held back than to dare and do ... but being held back has not put miles into my personal journey, no? I wondered if I just kept moving and not think too much maybe I'd put more value on the movement rather than the process itself. Because my personal process is innate. In my quest to be "normal", I think I am going to have to concede to the truth that I am not a person that runs on management paradigms. It works for some people, but in my case, I don't think it does for me.

Or maybe I am also running on a personal strategy which is basically understanding life more in order for me to live it fully according to my own terms. And a spontaneous girl that I am I should not fight against my schema.