Even though man is memorably more talented than all other creatures on this planet, and to his knowledge, singularly so universally, he still can only do two things: talk and act. His consciousness talks, the rest of him acts, and consciousness continually makes vows of action which his acting does not keep, (indeed many promises which man cannot meet).
This ceaseless cycle of consciousness promising to take, or refrain from, certain action in the future and routinely failing to do so is, (by ready observation), a condition normal to man. In fact, one which obliquely contributes to his creation and constant improvement of the non-natural environment he has fashioned for himself, but it is also an arrangement. Though not seen in this light, much disturbs the minds of a few and drives them to undertake uncommon inquiries and odd practices.
Not being able to fulfill promises they have made regarding their behavior is a condition so familiar to man as to be a cliché. How quickly is a diet undertaken, abandoned; a pledge to stop smoking, forgotten, and so on. It is simply the nature of a man’s consciousness to make endless pronouncements concerning promised changes in his behavior which not only are never realized, but are routinely forgotten as soon as they are said. Ordinary men are made to condemn these in themselves as failures, and to pretend that they suffer over same. It is observably a natural part of their ordinary existence, and not an anomaly. It can be seen as indirectly encouraging him to “do better” in areas where the unthinking, unspeaking rest of him would never venture.
Crudely, but not invalidly put: the mental imposition of guilt spurs man on in activities in which his sensual interest is near nil. The neurons that constitute his consciousness look in a mirror, and a man declares: “I must lose weight,” an action that no other cells or parts of his body have any interest in whatsoever. His consciousness says in his head that he looks lumpy and dumpy, with all descriptions of physique, (favorable or not), being meaningless gibberish to his physique. His consciousness made a promise which, via its unique ability, it may be able to impose on his stomach for a while, but in routine men, when decisions made by their consciousness conflict with the temperament of their instincts, consciousness loses.
That is the nature of that situation,
about which nothing further need be noted to the bright eyed/”I-ed.”
J.