Day 56

Another week down as we approach 60% of the PCP.

I'm flipping through the news on the earthquake and tsunami in Japan and came across a chronicle of families who went out to public parks and squares with their survival bags all neat, no panic or histeria, and just sat on the benches to wait. Amazing! This is the most outstanding demonstration that discipline, individual and social, pay off in the face of catastrophe. Strict building rules minimised damages, people's awareness minimised the massive loss of lives (300 or so is the death toll, sad indeed, very sad, but nothing compared to Haiti or Pakistan). Trains in Tokio are starting to work again and the ice skating world cup will take place on 20th March (not the slightest crack on the stadium building). So, bad news but great example. I'm not a fan of generalization myself and therefore tend to disregard expressions starting with "Society must understand..." or "Throughout history, mankind...", which epitomise the rhetoric of politicians that make the crowds believe crowds are intelligent and rational. But I do acknowledge there are exemplary social behaviours and social results that are inevitably linked to individuals not each doing only what's best for themselves, but also sticking to rules and norms, which is the best course of action to being effectively compassionate.

Millions of things combined in specific ways are needed to achieve such advanced societies. But if I may extrapolate to my own personal experience, I have realised by way of doing the PCP, which requires great discipline and commitment, that changing eating habits and exercising triggered a myriad of positive changes in almost all other aspects of my life. So maybe it isn't necessary to tackle all problems or pursue all goals at once, but simply to do one thing right to trigger a cascade of changes, behavioural and spiritual, that might just do the trick of making life all better. I have also learned over the past 56 days that adherence to the programme is only possible if you understand why and what you're doing.

So, back to those Japanese families: they didn't rush out yelling histerically and propagating panic, but knew what and why they had to do. In fact, the people most scared in the streets were almost all expats, awed by the apparent lack of expression among the faces of the Japanese crowd.

It's also amazing to observe how chain reactions or "macro-behaviours" sudenly roll out. It takes just one person, not necessarily characterised by being a leader, to do something sensible and visible for others to follow. People seating around me in the office now give me money almost every day at 11am when I'm about to go downstairs to the organic market to buy my morning snack. I come back with fruit which they seem/pretend to prefer over croissants. I don't blame them for not wanting to eat their fruit with an egg on the side (I like it quite a lot). One of my colleagues even said she found eggs disgusting and dangerous (allergens, cholesterol, etc).

OK, perhaps I went too far. There is no real connection between an earthquake in Japan and our PCP individual experiences. I just made these connections inevitably, hoping Patrick and his loved ones are all safe and well. But, somehow I think I'm not that far off the path to a round thought. I didn't go to the shrink or get a gastric bypass to be happier and lean, and therefore stronger, younger and capable of taking care of myself throughot life. All I did was jumping rope every day and eating food.

Have a good weekend!