two heads are better than one

I don’t know who came up with that now-clichéd saying, but they got it right. Certain things are accomplished (subconsciously) when in groups of two or more, yet for some reason we feel embarrassed to have a go at them alone. Maybe I’m being paranoid, or perhaps self-conscious to think this way, but hear me out.

I first experienced this ‘paranoia’ at the gym, since more often than not, no thanks to my lazy friends, I exercise alone. I noticed the first time you use any non-straightforward equipment is a tricky task. There is a time limit associated with your learning ability - let that drain and you must abandon the mission.

There is nothing worse than not being able to figure out how to operate something that hundreds of regular people use with such ease. You stand there, quickly reading the instructions, if there are any, and begin to think that EVERYONE has just stopped doing what they were doing and are waiting to see how long it’ll take before you give up. But I’m not the only one. There are times that I see others looking at me, memorizing my position and movements and then futilely mimicking it before, pretending they didn’t want to use that machine anyway, moving on. Now what is interesting to me is that given two people in this same exact situation, there are absolutely no worries. You can take a full hour trying to figure something out without a care in the world. As if to say their stupidity justifies yours. “We’re just a couple of dumb people… nothing to see here - move along.”

Same philosophy can be applied to many other situations. You’re walking down a semi crowded street and you realize you’re going in the wrong direction, but you can’t quickly turn around. Everyone has seen you walking in THIS direction. Surely they all noticed you had something to do in THIS direction, you turning around at this point would only confirm their suspicion that you are lost. You simply cannot have your reputation ruined in front of all these complete strangers. So you continue taking a few more steps and then, as if you just realized you had left the oven on, you give off a fake “ohh!” and angrily make your u-turn. Now you’ve justified yourself and have proven to your critics that you were indeed on the right path had it not been for this minor yet inconvenient annoyance. Bravo, no one suspected a thing - someone should give you an Oscar for your magnificent performance.

Now take that above situation and add a second person. “Dude, we’re totally going the wrong way.” Problem solved. No acting, no awareness, nothing. Pure bliss.

Thankfully everyone carries a cellphone these days and you can get away with murder while using one. So dial away the next time you’re out alone, whether its shopping at the mall, or while in the waiting room at the dentist. Pretend you’re an important, busy person and no one will bother to analyze your existence.