Racing towards nothing
Life is racing, hopping from one day to another, getting closer to the finish line and somehow, the subtleties of life are being lost in its pace. A day which is so beautifully designed by nature to live and experience the rise and fall of light just like life, all we chase are shadows. From the morning alarm to the exhaustive days where we hop from meeting to meeting until we see ourselves back to the bed, the day just vanishes like it was never there. Or it was there just like yesterday or the day before, like a never-ending repetition. But, while we are spending ourselves every day, there are moments when life knocks at our consciousness, trying to talk to us, urging us to look beyond our mundane works at the bigger picture. Unfortunately, most of us miss that call, because we have learnt the dangerous trait of keeping ourselves busy for every moment while we are awake. Those small slots when we aren’t working and could cherish the moments, we have sadly filled with technology. Smartphone, television, internet etc stream a never-ending streak of data to satiate our addiction of mindless ogling at screens. With the omnipresent marketing of data through more data, it’s a vicious cycle that gets triggered with every beep on the phone. While we stumble upon data all day long trying to know everything, life sarcastically smiles at us for our ignorance and failure at doing the most important thing – to experience.
The ‘me’ time
While the burst of data has cloaked the human minds, not letting anyone think straight, the path to get back control is simple but most difficult. This path could be summarized in just two words – do nothing. When catching up a break during the day, just fight away the urge to pick up your phone and rather sit idle. When you reach home after a long tiring day falling onto your couch, don’t switch on the television and rather lie down, doing nothing. The ‘me’ time is the only way to regain control. Simple, isn’t it? However, the average attention span of humans have reduced to just eight seconds, which means if you had started reading this article and you are still reading it, either you are a very fast reader or your focus is above average. The truth is that how many times do we find the phones slipping into our hands, playing one video after another, or just scrolling the posts irrelevant to our lives or checking scores or the stock prices. We humans are built to prefer convenience over right. When we are making our way through meetings, trying to resolve important issues, preparing critical presentations, our brain gets so tired by the end of the day that it tries to escape at the first chance of distraction. With technology, distraction comes easy. Doing nothing is really the most difficult thing that you can try to do.
We must try anyway. It is the only way to have that conversation with the real us and what the hell do we want. All the out-of-box ideas, innovations, inventions, solutions could only happen because people gave themselves that opportunity to think. ’Eureka’ moments happen to the Archimedes of the world because they are not scrolling through their phones inside the washroom.
Is it possible to resist the temptation of filling the idle time with distractions?
In order to understand how we can stop doing it, we need to know why we do it. It is our instant relief from stress that cuts us off from the stressful reality and takes us into an alternate but less stressful world. It is like a few minutes of high that helps us forget about the next important pending task or a bad meeting earlier that day. However, when it is over like any other high, it only brings in guilt as the emotions on hold rush back with a lot more power. But if sitting idle would only remind us of our stressful day and bad memories then the mind with its own immune system would build inclination to sway towards such temporary highs. Keeping your mind blank is the best result that you can expect out of this, but it won’t happen in one day or a week or even a month. Again, I am not talking about any meditation but keeping your mind idle as much as possible when it has nothing to do.
The first thing that we can ensure is to stay away from the devices. Don’t keep your phone at an arm’s length, rather intentionally leave it in a different room. Let the law of inertia work for you. If you are one of those guys who can stay thirsty for long just because the refrigerator is too far from the bed, this could very well work for you. What could be even better is that you can keep your phone silent, such that the beeps of notifications couldn’t tempt you.
You can also try going out for walks without your phones. An early morning walk can be most rejuvenating as the soothing combination of peace, nature, and fresh air can give you perspectives like nothing else. Seeing what you are looking at and listening to what you are hearing is the best way of being. You are most aligned to the universe when you can look at things inside out while your stimuli don’t ask for a response but rather empowers your peace. It might sound so simple, but it isn’t easy.
Discipline yourself to read books. This can be that one single habit that holds the key to transforming your life. There are books on peace, self-discipline, habits, spirituality, motivation, finance, health, happiness, on everything that comes to your mind. Every challenge that we face, every solution that we seek, every situation that we anticipate, has been faced by many men and women in the history and few of them have been kind enough to share their experiences and what worked for them. It is the easiest way to know and to learn. But the best thing about reading is that you read it to yourself. You listen to your own voice, you talk to yourself, and you imagine. There can’t be any better exercise of senses.
Go slow, learn the art, do nothing!
There can be tens of other ways to keep yourself idle, but nothing could work without a strong will power. Every time we give in to the temptations of these data highs, we further get away from a self-controlled peaceful mind. More we slip harder it gets the next time. Many of us have got overboard to miraculously bring disciplines in our lives. Rising early in the morning, long sitting hours to study, exercise, punctuality and what not – most of us have tried to adopt one of these habits as a new year resolution or as a part of ‘that’s enough’ response to our daily frustrations. However, most of us have failed in our attempts. A big bang approach rarely works, but what always works is a small step at a time. Let’s take those small steps before we start taking those long strides. Let’s start with an hour in a day without our phone, reading one page of a book every day, and walking half a kilometer every morning. Such small exercises of willpower can help you grow your core strength to live your life on your own terms, something rare nowadays. Well, discovering this dying art of staying idle is the best thing we can accomplish in this life and all its going to take is – doing nothing