Myth or fact??

Well the other day I was boiling milk for my morning cup of tea. I was pretty sleepy considering the lack of sleep I had due to my German exams preparation. I was almost half asleep and some how the milk boiled and spilled all over the gas stove. I was super frustrated mainly because of the cleaning and started to crib about it. Just then my mother said it was really lucky to have overflown milk! I wondered how on earth could overflown milk be lucky? Was I going to top in my exams? Was the paper going to be easy? Then began my flow of thoughts… Is it myth or truth?

Well we Indians or let’s be general we Humans have a lot of beliefs. Good or bad, true or false, meaningful or meaningless, we have them. Where do these thoughts come from??

Long long ago our forefathers were pretty smart people! They had their basics correct but they couldn’t get people to understand it scientifically and rationally. So they had a solution, why not put everything on god and luck. People may not have believed at first but then when they had bad results might have started to believe and pass on the word of mouth that the myth works! Do you think this is still applicable today??

So for instance a black cat crossing your way is considered to be a sign of ill luck! What can that poor feline have to do with your luck? I tried to dig more into it! In olden days people mainly traders used to travel by bullock carts or horse carts through villages. On their way at night if a cat seemed to cross their paths, it was advised to stop for the night and not continue the journey. It can now be understood that the bright shiny cat eyes with jet black colour which was the colour of pretty much everything at night and that could baffle the cart carrier animal and in turn make the travel risky. So the hault for the night!

Similarly the myths of not cutting nails at night causing you loss of money or myth of sweeping house after evening prayers bringing bad consequences were not completely irrational. During earlier days people were not lucky enough to have LEDs or lamps or even tubelights, thus cutting nails after sunset would pose a threat of hurting oneself or sweeping could pose a risk of losing something valuable which otherwise would not have been in the daylight.

Another very famous myth is that dropping salt on the floor or giving salt in someone’s hand could cause poverty. Again the reason being that salt was a very expensive commodity and thus it was obvious that it’s wastage would subsequently mean wastage of money.

Even everyday principles had logic. Like people used to wake up early. They used to do fasting, go to the temple. Then start their day. Why was this a perfect start to the day? And why do we cringe at the thought of doing that? You would do it religiously if your dietician diagnoses you with vitamin D deficiency or with obesity! Yes earlier the temples used to be little away like on hilly areas. To reach there, there was need for workout. This used to be early morning when there is sunlight good to boost the vitamin D levels. Once you reached the temple post the workout enroute, the priest would hand the devotee some Tulsi water and a fruit or payasam or similar healthy food as a blessing which the devotee savored as a healthy instead if lattes or cappucinos for breakfast! So that was the myth-fact relation I could figure.

Still scratching my head and pondering over what is the logic behind the overflown milk! Do mention any myths or truths you know!!!!!