Take a moment and place yourself in the shoes of your local zoo’s gorilla. While embodying that gorilla, day-in and day-out, we would be limited to the interactions, food, and activities that we are limited and accustomed to. For years, we would have lacked any sort of exhilarating liberation from the prison we would call our “ habitat,” or rather, the habits we were victimized into adopting as a result of our environment and limited ability to reason. We would wake up, feed ourselves and our infant gorillas, attempt to entertain ourselves and our children, sleep some more, eat some more, get frustrated by the tourists who pester us, and we would repeat the same daily pattern in an endless cycle. Nothing new. Nothing stimulating. Nothing to look forward to.

Yet, as anticipated, the tourists would leave as scheduled, and we would return to the same limited cage we were self-subjecting ourselves to every day of the life we lived. That endless cycle of repetition, day-in and day-out, would become our habit. This being, the very habitat we would maintain throughout the entirety of our limited lives, the habit which we would find a sense of security and comfort in, up until the day we passed. But what does it mean to “die” when we live every day of our lives like that of these caged, zoo-gorillas? What value would life have if we were to be trapped in this cage of limited life-opportunity?

We are all guilty of trapping ourselves in cages at one point in our lives or another; this cage being, the cage of “habit.” Certain habits can be a great thing, if they are rituals that improve you as a person. However, for the sake of this reflection, I want to focus on the negative habits we encompass (our tendencies to act as “creatures of habit”). We humans are, by nature, victim to living out the entirety of our lives as creatures of habit. In fact, society indirectly encourages and praises us in doing so. We are taught to attend and graduate from a “good” university, get a “good” job, get married, start a family, and work the rest of our lives into mere oblivion. We endure this huge weight of a limited life in expectation that we will be payed-back in some way, for our tedious physical, mental, and emotional efforts.

We often press through this burden solely for the expectations we have for the impending “treat” of our next banana, or vacation (in reference to those in the work-force, for instance). We fall victim to our habits. In other words, we limit the experiences that could fill the emptiness in our stomachs, and fuel the opportunity we call our lives. More often than not, we weigh the temporary “reward” from our precious habitual-sacrifices more highly than we weigh the opportunity of living life in anticipation for new experiences and a greater degree of long-term fulfillment.

Many self-victimize the quality of their lives out of pure ignorance. A man named, Alex Pentland, so beautifully worded that, “we humans suffer from an advanced case of self-delusion. We like to see ourselves as free-minded, conscious beings, self-governing, and set apart from other animals by our capacity for reasoning.” As much as this can be true, our actions do not always align with this way of perceiving ourselves. As such, we like to think that we are free and open-minded beings. However, when new opportunities and experiences present themselves, we tend to retreat back into our pens, the comfort we find in our habits. As it is truthfully said, “old habits die hard.” When we don’t let these habits “die” and when we refuse to keep an open mind, we consciously reason and govern ourselves into a deep pit that is ever-so difficult to make our way out of.

As a result of living out our lives in the “cage” of our habits, we lose sight of what it means to be free from the restraints that limit our experiences and our potential for growth. This is similar to how a gorilla would cease to experience its true power and animal-potential as a result of its ignorance regarding his or her power to escape the enclosure than confines and suppresses the quality of their life. It is not as if the gorilla doesn’t embody enough power to escape his enclosure. The gorilla merely choses not to, on the basis that he or she has grown accustomed to the same routine; that same routine, encompassing a much-anticipated “treat” of banana, which provides only temporary satisfaction.

However, I do want to place emphasis on the point that bliss can be found in ignorance. Take for instance, a man named “Jerry.” He first tried ice-cream and liked it when he went to the zoo as a child. Since then, he has only ever been open to eating vanilla ice-cream, because he associated it with one good experience he has as a child. Odds are, when he matures into adulthood and out of his adolescence, he would view vanilla ice-cream as “the best flavor of ice-cream.” The man would view it as such, simply because he has not tried any other flavors. Perhaps if Jerry didn’t fall into his habit of purchasing only vanilla ice-cream his entire life, he would place more favor on another kind of flavor.

On the other hand, Jerry’s friend, “Leo,” has tried vanilla ice-cream at the same zoo as a child, and he liked it as well. However, because “Leo” was not closed minded, nor did he habitually purchase only vanilla ice-cream following his initial visit to the zoo, he found that he liked other flavors more than he liked vanilla. Because of Leo’s open-mindedness, he had more choices and likely felt more fulfilled than Jerry every would have. This is simply due to the fact that Leo did not limit himself to only those things he found comfort in (these comforts being habits that could have been developed).

Although this example may come across as pathetically-simplistic, it demonstrates how our choice to continue in our “habits,” which find comfort in, rather than being open-minded, we restrain ourselves from experiencing greater joy, and greater liberating and eye-opening opportunities…some of the very factors that contribute to our self-growth and future life-success. A gorilla has the power to break down its enclosure and discover its true animal potential. You have the power to be open-minded, refuse to remain a “creature of habit,” and in-turn, discover the extent of your human-potential. Will you let your habits dictate the trajectory and happiness of your life? You have the power, and it is in your hands.