“He Runs. Ah: runs. Runs”

This is how John Updike ends his novel “Rabbit, Run.” Although this is about Harry (Rabbit) Angstrom running away from his responsibilities, I find it apt to describe the situation of those whose flight instincts are at its best when they are in the company of a cribber 😉

Have you ever thought about why we crib?
When we feel trapped, isn’t it?

When do we feel trapped?

When we are asked to choose from the choices that someone deems right. We live in a society which makes us believe that we have the freedom to decide what we want. However, it also dictates the choices from which a good decision is hard to come by. Just like Arjuna who didn’t want to wage war with his own family was given a choice to either run or to stand up and fight.

So, we at times may feel trapped in a situation that we aren’t comfortable with. How do we fight that? How could we make another person see why something doesn’t interest us? That’s something to ponder.

When should we vent? I have noticed that nobody has the time, nor do we care much when we are just at the receiving end of the process. Which is, when we are not allowed to participate, but just be there actively listening to someone vent. So, I don’t vent unless I have something to achieve. Venting does two good things:

• sure, it does relieve us of the tension
• But, it also dissuades the person from making us participate in something that we aren’t comfortable with(this is what I am aiming at, mostly)

When we are trying to avoid someone/something, that someone/something should find us boring too.

I have watched others and myself closely, and have understood one thing that we can’t stand someone venting for long and, we try to avoid it. So, sometimes venting comes to our aid when we want someone to feel discouraged and bored when asking us to be a part of something that doesn’t interest us.

Does that mean, we don’t care about others who are sad? We should also remember that those who are listening are also human. Sometimes we get drawn into the conversation and get affected too. Also, in today’s time, who has the time? Let me demonstrate that with an example.

What are we expecting when we ask, ‘How are you?’

When we ask ‘How are You?‘ to someone, as a social norm; we expect that someone to take that more as a social greeting and not as an opportunity to launch their version of how they are.

When they do, we are obligated to listen, however, we are also wondering how to excuse ourselves from not having to hear all that. Let’s be honest.

I personally think, venting our troubles is not as healthy, as they claim it to be unless we are getting somewhere with it. But if we are just going round in circles, it’s time we stop else the Rabbit is gonna run, run faster and away from us 😉

Just as Krishna wouldn’t bother wasting his time over Duryodhana. Likewise, we don’t have to expose ourselves to toxic venting. Nobody has to tell, we will know when the line is crossed.

Images: Internet