Me petting GVB.  One of my favorite ways to “do nothing.”

 

From being judged for having a to-do list, to watching my neighbor cut his grass a zillion times a week—this is what reminded me that there’s only one person responsible for artfully juggling the balancing act of doing vs. non-doing in your life.

You can dance in a field, you can write a novel.  Build computer software or bake an apple pie.  Sit in the grass and listen to the birds sing, or take a jet plane on a whim to Timbuktu…

No matter what it is, everything you do is just as important as what you’re NOT doing.

Here’s what I mean…

So I was having a conversation with someone recently about lists.

How you make a list to do this and do that and keep getting things ACCOMPLISHED.

I mentioned that lately I’d been in the good habit of making a list of everything I wanted/needed to get done and when I was able to check something off my list it felt so good.

It was really helping me get things done.

Such a wonderful way to get your thoughts/priorities in order and outline for the day/week, whatever, what it is that’s most beneficial to see done.

That’s when the conversation turned a bit sour.

He began to give me a little lecture on “our society” and how everyone just keeps doing doing doing and has to be constantly busy.  And he was lumping me in with that.

Well, I agree, I thought, yeah, some people are doing doing doing  for the sole purpose to just be DOING… but wait, wasn’t the whole point of this conversation just about how making lists is beneficial and helpful…which inherently involves DOING? And now doing is evil?!

Suddenly I was being judged.  Basically being told it’s “wrong” to DO DO DO and that I had to take time to do, well, nothing.

Well DUH. I wanted to say.

Hey, trust me, I can be the King (Queen) of doing absolutely. nothing.

And I don’t feel bad about it either. (UNLESS there are things I really do NEED to accomplish and I’m simply procrastinating—in which case I have a horrible restless feeling that’s usually riddled with moments of anxiety and stress!)

Doing nothing is wonderful! Hey, you don’ t have to tell me that! I wanted to yell (well maybe not yell, but at least raise my voice a little : ) at him.

BUT , there was no reason in telling him that.

Instead I just did the ol’ smile and nod thing and pretended like yep yep, I agree.

Course, in this case I did actually agree, but more importantly, I didn’t find it necessary to try and defend myself and my list and my happiness in crossing things off said list.  I didn’t find it necessary to justify to him any of my actions or current lifestyle habits.  I didn’t find it necessary to try and convince him: BUT WAIT! SOMETIMES I DO DO NOTHING!

Didn’t matter.

Why? Because I realized quickly it was a one-sided conversation.  I was being talked AT, not with.  (Ever experience that?)

He knew better than I did (but not really, he just thought so—and I just chose not to engage because it wasn’t worth my energy to challenge his assumptions or correct his perspective about me, because who cares, *I* know who I am and how I live and what I do, and WHO is this random dude to judge me?)

So here’s another story-

A neighbor of mine is CONSTANTLY mowing his grass. Haha! Well, or so it seems.

His grass will look like a centimeter tall and I’m like, “ope! Where’s the neighbor?! Why isn’t he out there cutting his grass?! It looks craazzzyy out there!”

Which isn’t true of course, I’m just being silly about it, because I do find it comical that he’s out there so often when the yard already always looks perfect before he started.

My boyfriend is convinced he hates his life and that he must bicker with his wife a lot.  (Which I think is a pretty darn funny [and random] speculation!)

Another theory of mine is that he just has the TIME to do it.  He’s a bit older, most likely retired, so maybe he’s cutting his grass so much for SOMETHING TO DO.  Filling up his days being busy.  Trying to STAY busy.

Or maybe he cuts his grass simply because he LIKES to.  Maybe it’s like mediation for him.  Or maybe he’s trying to win (a nonexistent?) Yard of the Year award.

WHO KNOWS.  It doesn’t much matter what anyone from an outside perspective speculates (i.e. ME!), because the point is:

Making a list and being busy isn’t a sin.  Cutting your grass 16 times a week isn’t a sin.

And I’ll be bold and say doing NOTHING all the time isn’t necessarily a sin either for that matter.  (Hey, part of me always wanted to be a “nun” [or something of the sort] and just be able to “pray” and “meditate” all the time… which some people would say is “doing nothing.”)

The only time anything from the list above becomes a problem is when you tip yourself out of alignment.  When your life becomes “out of balance.”  But the only person who knows that is YOU.

When your list CONSUMES  you and you’re filling it up merely to have it filled up, merely to have a superficial fleeting moment of pseudo satisfaction and you never have a second to just sit down and BREATHE.

When cutting your grass 16 times a week is because you’re afraid to sit alone for 5 minutes in silence.  If cutting your grass like a maniac is a band-aid that tries to cover what it is that’s really important, and what perhaps you really need to be doing instead.

When doing nothing at all all the time (unless of course you ARE a nun, monk, etc.– in which case the “real world” doesn’t apply to you : ) causes you to avoid or ignore responsibilities and obligations in life that we simply must attend to, whether or not we really WANT to.

And of course “doing nothing” is open for interpretation in its own right.  “Nothing” to one person may be “something” to someone else, and vise versa.

Everything you’re not doing is just as important as what you are doing, because one or the other gives space for the opposite.

Depending on your mood, on any given day you can do EVERYTHING (humanly and time-wise possible) or NOTHING AT ALL.  It’s up to you! What a beautiful freedom we have in life!

You can live today completely differently than you did yesterday, and tomorrow completely differently than today.  And you’re the only judge of time well spent.

When we do (or not do) things with conscious intention and/or purpose, it doesn’t really matter what the outside world thinks, because if we’re living truthfully with ourselves, we know inside that we’re doing just what’s right for US… in that moment, in that day, in that period in our lives.

 

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Leave a comment and tell me: Which do you enjoy more- being busy or “doing nothing”? Which side do you need to balance out?