Nearly every day we see runners, swimmers and weightlifters who look unhappy and tense as they put themselves through their exercise routines. Why do they do it? To stay fit? To live longer or look better? What might the truth be! Niels Bohr the scientist said “The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement but the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth”.
Since I have no profundities to offer I thought that for the time it takes to read this column, we could reflect on what keeps our minds and spirits going from day to day: the human body. Besides, the closing month of the year might be the right time to meditate (however fleetingly) on the fantastic “carriage” which has brought us through another twelve months and how we take it for granted till it begins to creak or break down!
Perspectives
Different cultures and philosophies view the human body differently. Some feel it is an enemy waiting to pounce like a tiger on the being that inhabits it leading to humiliation and hardship. St Augustine called it, “This ass, my body.” Some think that it is a site of battle: the Dark waging constant war against the Light. Some believe it is an adversary to be controlled with punishments and endurance tests. T.E Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) used to put himself on a diet of bread and water while he cycled miles every day uphill and down, and even setting alarms more than once at night in order to practise waking and falling asleep at will, all the while studying the state of his own mind. As we know, his was an extraordinary life. Was he right to have imposed a crushing will on his natural instincts?
There is some talk today of chronological age and subjective or ‘felt’ age with studies across countries and societies on people who feel and look younger than their calendar years say they are. So what do you think your most intimate dwelling place is? A temple? A trap? Are you comfortable in it? Do you take care of it? If you don’t a time will surely come when it will not co-operate with you!
Food and nutrition
A distinguished food scientist who celebrated his 100th birthday last month said that health was to be found on the farm and not in a pharmacy. From eating locally available foods city dwellers have become world travellers as far as their food choices are concerned, with the well-fed section of the globe taking not only its nutrition as an entitlement but preferences as well and even the right to reject — sometime with contempt — some item of food which isn’t to their taste. And yet every kind of food is actually sacred being a produce of the Earth. Even a middle-schooler knows that his body is made up of the vital sap of the Earth drawn from its gross elements: the soil, air, water and energy (heat). Should any healthy food be wasted or set aside for want of salt or garnish?
I felt that we could all think of how and what we eat as we move into the next year remembering to look after our bodies carefully enough to get us through life but without pampering or investing excessive vanity or self-regard in the process, all the while understanding perfectly that it is a means, an instrument to be used carefully and neither neglected nor softened into inertia.
The author is Series Editor, Living in Harmony (Oxford University Press).
