Although I love a rich life, I hate an overcrowded life. I believe in rumination and lose half the beauty of all things when I am deprived of the time to ruminate. Author Anais Nin.
A friend once commented that her daily walks offered her time to ruminate. Many of the thoughts we all ruminate about turn to situations over which we have no real control - COVID -19, politics, climate, religion. Of course, we can shelter at home, learn the facts, vote absentee, act kindly toward our neighbors, recycle as much as possible, pray often.
And while my friend’s concerns are real, her use of the word “ruminate” caught my attention.
As with so many words, this one particularly has an evolving history. While humans were certainly aware that cows chewed cud and humans had the capacity to mull ideas over early on, it wasn’t until the Renaissance, between the 14th-17th centuries, a period of cultural, artistic, political and economic “rebirth,” that words for such concepts were recorded.
Much to my surprise, the first English recording of a collection of words starting with “to ruminate,” dated 1533, applied only to humans. According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, the definition, in the 14th century,” referred only to the action of contemplating concerns, “to go over in the mind repeatedly, often casually or slowly.”
By the 15th century, 1661, the concept in England that animals like cows, deer, goats, sheep, giraffes, camels, llamas chewed grasses over and over was recorded with the word “ruminant,” an animal that chews cud. In 1707, “rumen,” the large first compartment of a ruminant’s stomach in which cellulose is broken down,” was first recorded. All forms of these English words derive from Latin “ruminari,” the Latin name for the first stomach of ruminant animals.
And with that fact of origin, we know that human beings, as early as the 6th century BC were aware of the animals that chewed cud and had multiple stomachs to assist with digestion. It was an easy transition to transfer the “chewing, pondering, musing” action to human contemplation.
For centuries, humans have been quite content for both animals and individuals to ruminate, to chew something over and over again, literally for ruminants to chew cud, and figuratively for people to chew ideas. Many great concepts have evolved from the ruminations of scientists, theologians, even politicians. Think Louis Pasteur, Martin Luther and the founding fathers of the United States.
Yet by the 21st century, human “rumination” has taken on another concept, ominous to say the least. I don’t know why we humans feel obligated to take perfectly good words and change their meanings entirely. Whatever happened to the desire to create new words for new understandings. I’m not faulting the psychologists and psychiatrists who have sought to treat a real human condition. I’m faulting them for distorting a perfectly good word by naming a depression-causing condition “rumination.”
“Rumination,” according to Dr. Edward A. Selby, writing for Psychology Today, “is the tendency to repetitively think about causes, situational factors and consequences of one’s negative emotional experiences…taking these activities too far and for too long.” Such acts can lead to clinical depression and anxiety.
Even the mental experts acknowledge that ruminating correctly is the first step of problem solving. But when rumination takes over one’s life, it becomes destructive.
And so my friends, as we take our daily walks and ponder the ever growing concerns of this world, let us, too, mull over, contemplate, wonder why in this world we must forfeit perfectly good words which have stood the test of time to those who would give them negative connotations.
Twenty-first century yoga expert Amit Ray offers advice to those who ruminate too much. “As cow, deer, and goat chew food again and again in endless circles, overthinking creates an endless loop and exhaust energy. Conscious micro-meditation can bring you out of the loop.”
Or as 20th century psychologist and philosopher William James says, “The sovereign cure for worry is prayer.”
2020
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