Trained like a DOG

Now I mean no offence for the dog or its species. You know how dogs cats or any domestic member of the animal species can be trained to respond to certain events such as eating at a particular time and so on so forth.. well I was wondering the same of humans. We react in so many situations in such a trained fashion and we don’t even know that we have been trained!

Consider this—I travel by bus a lot and have a university bus pass. Everyday when I get into the bus I pass my bus pass though a reader. Having done this for months I do this as a completely trained response without even thinking about it. Once when I got into the bus the machine wasn’t working and the driver had his hand over the slot so that I wouldn’t use it. Even though my brain registered this and heard the driver say just go in my hands were at a loss trying to get to the reader irrespective of all that was going on around this. The driver stared at me and finally feeling really stupid I went to the back of the bus to sulk at my idiocy. But then I noticed everybody who got onto the bus that day, reacted similarly walking back with the same smug expression on their face.

Then on St Patrick’s Day which was Saturday bus travel was free. So they had a cover over the reader with a sign that said..”Free”. I got into the bus and my hands were at a total loss looking for a slot somewhere where I could insert my bus pass! My brain kept telling me “Dumbo just get in and don’t block the way” but my body would just not respond! Again feeling really stupid started finally walking to the back of the bus.

This got me thinking that there are so many situations that we respond in such a trained manner from reactions that we assimilate through life. That scares me so much that half the time I don’t even think about what I am doing and what impact it might have.