Planners

NOW READING: A Passage to India by E.M. Forster

So, I can relate to Adela. Witness:

"Then she went back to her plans; plans had been a passion with her from girlhood. Now and then she paid tribute to the present, said how friendly and intelligent Aziz was, ate a guava, couldn't eat a fried sweet, practised her Urdu on the servant; but her thoughts ever veered to the manageable future..." - p. 149

And this ties into another recent realization I had about addiction. People often say things about an "addictive personality." Since I have been addicted to something before for which people feel quite comfortable judging you (cigarettes) I have had that "addictive personality" label slapped on me. I've often wondered what that really means, though. Apart from my endless fascination with my own alcoholism or lack thereof (one of my hobbies is taking the Signs You're an Alcoholic quiz and noting that I'm still not in the danger zone) I wonder if there is such a thing as an addictive personality. I mean, take heroin. I've seen how it wrecks lives. It was very physical. I'm not sure the personalities had anything to do with it.

However, my recent realization was about coffee, which if anything would be my current addiction. (And not necessarily Starbucks, although I am happily, cheekily in the "Addicted to Starbucks" group on Facebook.) Notice I didn't say caffeine. I believe my body is currently physically dependent on caffeine in the sense that I have a cup of coffee basically every morning and will have a headache in the evening if I don't. So that is definitely a "habit." But the addiction part is something more, and it amused me when I observed it about myself. On the day that I moved out of my Hofstra residence I still had a few things to pack in the morning. I was in slow motion, and still awaiting the arrival of my dad with the van, and I told Brian (who was so nice as to help me move, yay!) that I wanted to go get coffee first and then come back and finish packing and that would definitely be the more productive way to go. So we walked over to Dunkin' Donuts and back. I then proceeded to finish packing, efficiently, and I made room in bags and tied up loose ends and so forth.

Then I looked up and saw my Dunkin' Donuts iced coffee on the near-empty desk next to the clock radio and realized I'd drunk all of three sips of it. Greatly amused, I pointed it out to Brian: merely having acquired the coffee made me satisfied and I was able to move on and be productive. Of course I would eventually drink it (so as to avoid later headache) and even enjoy it (mmmm...cream, no sugar) but I had this great insight about what satisfying the WANT meant.

I wonder if this relates somehow to my love for planning. Don't you see how it could? It feeds something in me to make lists and make plans and craft and recraft my vision for the future (and reorder my Netflix queue). But I don't think I need to make plans and lists. I'm not sure I'm any more likely to do the things whether I make the lists or not. But I actually like to do it. And I think this also relates to how healthy it feels to meditate, and be mindful, and get my buddha nature on, and live in the moment.