Put your feet up. It’s Christmas.

That’s the message that’s emblazoned everywhere. It sort of encourages the idea that nirvana is sitting, flump, in an armchair watching the telly, dozing slightly from an excess of lunchtime party juice. It’s a popular image. If you listen carefully lots of people seem to dream of achieving a sort of permanent Christmas day slump when they retire. “When I retire, I’m gonna put me feet up”.

That may be an oversimplification, and lots of people will howl that they only meant it in jest. But quite often words uttered in jest contain a grain of truth. In this case it’s very often the inner chimp talking. And every time you rehearse that mantra it becomes just a little bit more likely.

The chimp, as I have mentioned in previous blogs, strives for the easy life. If it is sitting in the tree, fat, dumb and happy, then its world is all right. It’s programmed to seek this state because most of the time it has to be active, alert and slightly scared as it tries to feed and protect itself, or even create copies of itself. Chimps have no choice. They can’t build big walls to keep invaders out, they haven’t learned to farm, so feeding themselves is tricky and they haven’t even heard of a record deck and 12 inch remix let alone the joys of a whole nightclub’s worth of beer sodden carpets and thumping tunes where the young of the species can go to shout at each other encouragingly.

We humans are different. We have learned to work together so a lot of these tasks no longer tax us. But, like a car engine used only for pootling around town, we need to be stretched every so often. A lack of stretch is the root of quite a lot of depression. This is where you need to be aware of your inner chimp. It’s very quick to scream and loud enough to drown out your sensible human voice that knows your needs. Every time an opportunity to stretch yourself is presented your chimp will give you all the reasons why you shouldn’t take it. It will tell you every opportunity is really a threat. Worse, it will help you construct a protection against that threat. Each layer of protection is a little closer in. First time you went out for a walk on a cold clear day, you forgot your gloves. Next time you took your gloves but also put on an extra layer. Next time you didn’t go so far. Then you went out in the car. Then you stayed in. Your inner chimp is carefully enticing you to sit, flump, in that armchair, remote control in hand and brain slowly atrophying.

I have seen several couples struggle with this. One partner is quite happy listening to the siren call of the chimp, the other feels the stress of being ‘sucked in’. The shared experiences cease, perspective narrows, there’s not so much to laugh about so humour packs its bags and leaves. It’s not a hugely rewarding life that’s left.

As many of you know one of my favourite expressions is ‘A sense of humour is common sense with its dancing shoes on’. Humour is the elixir of a fulfilling life. I believe it’s about perspective, and perspective comes from experiences. So every time your inner chimp tries to construct a protection against another potential opportunity ask yourself: “Is my world contracting?”