Branded Blog

Almost 4 years ago while training as a yoga teacher I came across the idea of  “sanskara”.  Sanskara has varying definitions, but in general they agree on the idea of there being repetitive pathways or patterns in our lives that are embedded in our minds. They are said to be the impressions from past experiences – and, if you’re so inclined, past lives –  that are left on our subconscious minds and which form the fears, desires and habits that influence our future behaviours and responses.

They are, in short, the grooves or pathways in our minds and our lives that we keep re-treading as we live. They are the basis of habits, I guess. And while I’m certainly not a fan of woo-woo things generally, something about the idea of vinyl record like grooves that we create in our lives through our actions and thoughts made sense to me, so it stayed with me.

And I was reminded of it suddenly today when the Barefoot Man, Runnerbean, Phoebe-dog and I went for our customary Wednesday evening run on the mountain – something we’ve been doing more or less consistently (along with a Monday trot) since February this year.   Almost all of those bi-weekly runs / trots / ambles / slogs have been on Table Mountain. And I have pictures of the trails with accompanying rain, mist, wind, sunshine and even snowy hail to prove it!

Over and above the runs, we often spend at least one day of the weekend up on the mountain too – whether taking a picnic walk to a waterfall spot, shimmying up the chimney to complete the full Kloof Corner ridge assent, or even dangling near the edge of the Ledges route high above Newlands. So suffice to say that in the last year particularly, but over the last four years (to the day!) that I have lived in Cape Town, I have spent a fair amount of time on or below or around this mountain.

And yet today, on an ordinary Wednesday run, we took a route I have never taken. In fact, despite it having one of those large green “This is a route” signs at the start on Tafelberg road, just up from Platteklip, I don’t think I’d ever really even noticed it there, nevermind walked up it!

And yet, there it was. Hidden in plain sight, as they say. And it was spectacular. Not the most dramatic or scary route at all, but just an untried one. A new way up a very familiar hunk of rock that gave such lovely, subtly different views on the peaks and valleys that we see everyday, that I had to stop and take pictures even more than I usually do! I enjoyed it so much that it seemed out of kilter – after all, I know the mountain somewhat now. And yet, just a subtle shift of perspective, a slightly new angle, a varied way of getting up to the same path we run each week made the world of difference. Even the path and the waterfalls that we know felt different because the way we got there was new.

It struck me that it was so wonderful to remember that a small shift can help you rediscover the beauty and joy of something you  know so well!

The “sanskara” of the routes we default to (although varied, and constantly different in each season) had already dulled my sense of awe just ever so slightly, and I needed to step out of that groove to be wowed by it all again.

The idea of pathways in the mind is not restricted to Hindu or yogic philosophy by any means. Dan Dennet, the impressive philosopher, talks about the idea of neurons and neural synapses that are constantly competing. His theory, effectively,  is that the more you do or think something, the stronger that synapse or neuron or neural pathway becomes. And if you stop believing or doing something, the energy that was being used to create that neural pathway is quickly redirected elsewhere. So, at a broad view, the same idea as sanskara: if you keep doing something, the pathway in your mind gets deeper. And sometimes you get stuck in this way of thinking.  It can become hard to imagine a different way of doing or being when you’re so used to the grooves you’re in and so efficient at. But you can also get so used to doing things this way, that you get bored of them, or start forgetting how wonderful they actually are.

Luckily, all it takes to get some perspective on how wonderful your mountain actually is, is to slow down enough to see the sign for a new pathway, and then to make the effort to take it. Sure, it takes much more attention and energy to run a new trail the first time, but it’s also exhilirating! It’s great not knowing exactly how many turns there are on the trail, or how steep the next section will be – and you feel like you’ve accomplished so much more when you reach the waterfall than if you’d taken the normal route.

It’s easy to get stuck in doing things the way we usually do them. But it can be magical to find an untried pathway up your mountain, or business, or partner and, in taking it, regain some perspective & rediscover just how special they are.

Who knows, you might fall in love all over again…