The frog that didn't know it was cooked.

If you put a frog in a cauldron filled with cold water.  The frog will feel nothing.  The water is as usual and everything is fine.

Then start the oven.  But very slowly.  At first the frog will feel nothing.  Then the water will start to getting warm.  Still the frog will do nothing.  Its knows warm and it can handle it.  Then after a while the water will get hot.  Still the frog feels that its a little hot but it can adapt.  Then the water will get hotter.  By then the frog will get used to the temperature and when you're hot your muscles feels relax and you don't feel like any quick move and you feel like to sleep.  If you pursue.  The frog will cook and it will never know that its getting cooked.  It will never react before its too late.

On the other side.  Take a frog and put it into already hot water and it will instantly jump out of it.

Interesting isn't it?  Because we can apply this little story to many things in our lives.  Relationships, politics, society.

For example.  Ask any couple.  No one will tell you that it started going wrong on a Friday afternoon at 2h34.  Most will tell you that they don't really know.  It started just like this.  They started to move apart, evolve apart and so on...

Another example.  If you take television for the matter.  What we watch today is way more permissive than what we were used to watch like 20 years ago.  More sex, more coarse language.   Things that would be unthinkable to show 20 years ago like same sex couples for instance.  Where did that change come from?

Getting the idea now?  Its the cooking frog syndrome.  When a change is coming very slowly.  We do not notice the change until the day we wake up and it is too late.

How do we prevent this to happen to ourselves?  Is there tools to use to make sure that we watch and notice the increment changes so we can react fast?

There is.

They are three:

- Consciousness
- Memory
- Points of reference

Consciousness

First.  You have to be and remain conscious.

You have to be conscious of what is happening around you.  And what is happening inside you.  Have you ever felt that, you didn't know why but something was wrong.  Something was odd.  You couldn't identify why but its a feeling you had.  There is good chances that this was because the water was changing, it was getting hotter.  And even if you were adapting, you felt that something was going on.

So beware.  Constant vigilance.  Its hard to do.  It is very easy to lower our guard.  But we must learn to be vigilant at all times.  Now don't turn paranoid neither.  The other extreme is no better.  Just be aware.

Memory

We all have encountered scandals in the news on situation that were going on.  And we knew that a few weeks from now, no one would remember.  Its like that.  We don't have good memory.  So we must develop our memories.  Don't let things pass by unnoticed and once they're noticed.  Remember them.  So when it comes again the alarm will set off and you will remember.

If we do not develop a good memory.  How can we compare the now to what the situation was?  And then assess for ourselves if the new situation is good for us or worst?

Points of reference

How do we make sure that our schemes of analysis are good?  And remain good?  How can we make sure that we are not passing by something that we should have considered?

We have to develop points of references.  Both internal and external.  Internal, when you feel uneasy.  You don't really know why.  This is for sure that you feel the situation is some what different from what it used to be and the new change is now optimal to you as it used to be.  Listen to yourself.  Some times the rational analysis of the outside world will give you no insight.  But you feel deep inside you that something is going on.  Listen to yourself.  And make sure to recognise and know the meaning of you internal alarms.  If you don't already start studying yourself.

You also have to develop external points of references.  Has the point of view of others have change about you?  Not that you should care but this is material.  Indications that you can use.  Learn to see yourself in the mirror of others.  Once again not because you should care what they think of you.  But they reflect an image of you that you can use as a reference and see if it fits what you want.

The different stimulus you receive from the external world.  If it changes and makes you unhappy or uneasy.  This is an indication that something is going on.  The water might be getting hotter.  Now may be its not.  May be its something else.  But at least you'll have the tools to determine this.

Finally if your emotions changes.  Learn their meaning.  Why do you feel that way?  Why did it change?  What your inner self is trying to tell you that you brilliant rational self does not understand?