555

I was walking between our office and the JSK clinic today and my eyes chanced on a blue box on the ground. Coming closer I saw that it was an empty 555 cigarette packet.

Immediately my mind went back to reading Time and Newsweek magazines as a kid - and the dominant adverts of the day - sleek paens to sophisticated life - courtesy of attractively branded cancer-sticks.

Coming from a home where the very thought of lighting up just didn't exist I never thought the ads had any effect on me.

But they did.

About a decade ago I actually had a vivid dream that I was on a yacht surrounded by 'beautiful people' and I was lighting up.

How that thought would have lodged itself into my sub-consciousness - and why and when it showed up is a mystery.

I do know, however, that the allure of the elegant promise that the ciggie ads seemed to have is too subtle to just walk away from. I find myself amazed that just seeing a discarded 555 pack immediately brought such a cascade of past ads to mind.

And here I have such a struggle remembering the simplest part of scripture.

We seem hard-wired for destructive pleasure - and have a huge entropy deficit when it comes to the constructive.

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The upside of all of this is proof that we are able to analyse our thoughts and feelings. We may have muddled and perhaps even destructive thoughts / urges, but at least we can make sense of them. And we can choose (with God's help) to change. The good book says - be transformed, by the renewing of your mind.