I think this idea first struck me when I was climbing up the steps of the return flight from Leh, 6 years ago. In fact, I remember pausing for just that extra moment before I made my way into the aircraft. For a change, the people behind me weren’t hustling, maybe they felt the mood too. I checked the post I’d written about the trip, and sure enough, there was a mention in the last paragraph.
The idea is that if you were seeing someone/something for the last time, would the way in which you interact with him/her/it change? Would you be nicer, kinder, more caring, more thoughtful? In the instance above, I realised I might be seeing Leh for the last time, and wanted to soak it in just a bit longer.
Two recent experiences got me thinking about this again. First, I read a Boing Boing post on stoicism that introduced me to a name for this – negative visualisation. I then recalled that when I read Meditations, this was an underlying theme. An understanding and mindfulness of the transience of things. To quote from the post,
I also started making use of the Stoic technique known as negative visualization: I would periodically contemplate the loss of the things and people that mean the most to me. Thus, when parting from a friend, I might make a mental note that this could conceivably be the last time I would see the friend in question. Friendships do end, after all, and people die suddenly. Doing this sort of thing may seem morbid, but the practice of negative visualization is a powerful antidote to a phenomenon that will otherwise deprive us of much of the happiness we could be enjoying: negative visualization prevents us from taking for granted the world around us and the people in it.
The second experience was more personal. D had to make a three week trip to the US recently, and in her absence, I realised how much of an ‘easy life’ she was making it for me. From the drudgery of making breakfast to handling chores, I pretty much lost it and tore out whatever little hair I have left! The snapping, the tantrums, the sulks that still occasionally pop up despite my efforts to control them seemed a gross injustice to her. I realised again that despite watching the self, the tendency to take things and people for granted is not so easily dispelled. Mindfulness, dammit! Counter intuitive to the thought below, but I think negative visualisation can most definitely help.
