Motto: Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview - nothing more constraining, more blinding to innovation, more destructive of openness to novelty.

It is #noveltytuesday today on the InLeo platform, and I want to talk not about tech, or another new thing, but about the novelty as a concept. I mentioned Carlos Castaneda to someone a few days ago. If we were to listen to his shamanic tradition (which may or may not be true, according to some people), he was writing about this situation, when we, doing the same thing over and over, our inner being, our centre, soul or whatever name has in whatever culture, this centre of your being become fixed, losing its flexibility, making us inflexible and seeing the world only as one reality, fated not to change, never and ever. We become stuck in our reality, and we get old and die. But there is a solution, and that implies change. For us to not become inflexible and have a fixed, unchanging centre of our being, we need to do new stuff and to do it often. Even minor changes like walking to work on a different road everyday matter. Buying a new fruit and trying it, learning a new skill. Everything matters as long as we learn and we change something inside of us. For a Central American shaman as Don Juan, Carlos Castaneda's master, this was a way to achieve immortality. This, but also some important tasks, such as teaching others, when you learn enough to know how the world around you is. Even if we are to ignore the mystical side of this tradition, we can see that the focus is on learning and improving yourself, and passing down what you learn to other members of your 'tribe'. Which is not very different to what we try to do here, in the Western world, to become successful. Of course, we want more money and more power, instead of focus, magic and immortality, disguising our greed and desires under the guise of success, but the inner motivation is the same. As Darwin said, adapt and learn or lose and die. Only not so grim.

Even modern science discovered that this shamanic theory is true, as an act as simple as going to a new place for a holiday can have some surprising effects. Getting away is good for mental health and can help you de-stress, as we know that stress is the silent killer in our lives. Going to visit new places will make you walk more, and explore more, doing all that extra exercise is good for our health. After some walking, we may eat better, and healthier, and we may also try some new options, a greater variety in our diet leading to a better variety in our intestinal flora, and this is good, I try not to launch myself in an endless discussion about this, but I did write a book about it (and you can find it here - The other brain: Our gut-beneficial microbes you can read it for free if you have Amazon Prime). But I digress, so, where I was? Healthy eating, right? The next one, is good for the brain, as you may be quite often bored at home, doing the same routine over and over. Brain stimulation. Celebrating your success, being in a new place, right, this one is boosting your self-esteem. You know, that thing that goes down when we count our 'friends' yachts and private jets on Facebook. If you try to learn a few words in a new language, or a whole new language, this kind of activity keeps bad things like Alzheimer's and dementia at bay, so, more health benefits. Even your immunity improves, as you are exposed to new microorganisms, some good, some bad. Travelling to new places even increases your life expectancy (which takes us back, to maybe the Old World shamans were into something, with their efforts to achieve eternal life, and their theory is confirmed, at least partially, travelling to new places makes us healthier, make our brain better and faster, and even increases our lifespan).

I always loved to travel, so, I will end this post with one of my favourite pictures, from some long-forgotten holiday. Heck, I need to travel to some new place soon!

St.Paul Church, Bedford, UK

All the best,
George

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