Early in life, it’s simple. Our days are filled with playing, eating, and sleeping. As we grow older, new tasks to do appear. With only twenty-four hours, we cut back on the play, eat, and sleep to make room for these tasks - but we still make time for playing, eating, and sleeping. We know, on an intuitive level, that playing, eating, and sleeping are vital to our well-being.
At some point, like the proverbial boiled frog, our To Do list overflows, and the tasks become a higher priority than playing, eating, and sleeping. While the drivers for this flip are many, the outcome is the same: playing, eating, and sleeping are relegated to the “Later List.” A funny thing about this list - like the horizon, we never arrive in Later land. Our field of vision becomes a narrow slit, focused on the ever-demanding tasks of the To Do list. Any activities that divert from these tasks receive the pre-requisite knee jerk of “I don’t have time for that!” Welcome to the “Too Busy” trap - where playing, eating, sleeping or any activity that promotes health, creativity, and re-energizing are nowhere to be found.
Are we doomed as adults to be slaves to the unrelenting To Do list? Perhaps not. Our path to reclaiming balance can be found in the Zen proverb, “You should sit in meditation (or play, eat sleep) for twenty minutes every day - unless you're too busy; then you should sit (play, eat, sleep) for an hour.” In other words, when our lives have become out of balance, we need to make balance a priority - balance between the modes of being and doing. As children, being was the only mode we knew - we fully embraced each unfolding moment. As we grew older, we first experimented then honed our talents and skills, but we retained the capacity to shift from doing mode back into being.
The older we grow, however, we are swept away by our culture's high value of doing. Rather than viewed as equal partners, being becomes relegated to a lower rung on the “success” ladder. Even when we attempt to embrace enjoyable activities, we are challenged to shed the doing mode. While playing, eating, and sleeping, the drum beat of To Do list is never too far from our attention. The toll of this go, go, go can be seen on our bodies: studies reveal over half of our visits to our primary care doctors are stress-related. “All work and no play make Jack” and Jill not only dull but literally sick!
Back to our Zen proverb - a return to balance requires intentionality. The practice of mindfulness, no matter how brief, places us in being mode. Create a space in your day to step off the To Do list and slip into being mode. Perhaps instead of eating lunch at your desk, take your food outside and enjoy a beautiful day. Instead of walking and reading emails, raise your gaze and greet the eyes of the person approaching. Even a task such as doing dishes can become a moment of being by feeling the warm water, smelling the suds, and observing the sheen of the bubbles. Within each moment is the opportunity to shift from doing to being. And reclaim balance. Or in the melodic words of Frank Sinatra, “Do Be Do Be Do.”
Tags:
balance, stress
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Walking along a beautiful wooded path when suddenly your foot slips – how does your body respond? With a small tilt, we stiffen head-to-toe. Simply by becoming rigid, we stay upright and continue on our way. A larger stumble demands more flair – we flex and sway to bring our wayward body back under center. For a big tumble of the “OMG!” variety, we step into the spill. If all goes well, we stay upright, breathe a sigh of relief and continue unscathed.
With our body’s example of a multi-dimensional response to keep us on our feet, why do so many of us settle for just one option to maintain our emotional balance: the denial/distraction reaction? Denial and distraction are the emotional equivalent of our body’s stiffening reaction. We experience a short-term respite. During greater distress, this emotional rigidity quickly results in diminishing returns. Being limited to just one trick, we slip into “If I only try harder, it will work this time.” And down we go!
How can we expand our repertoire of responses to life’s emotional ups and downs? Mindfulness broadens our range of options through two steps. First, we begin to notice our knee-jerk slip into denial and distraction. We also notice the receding benefits of this limited reaction and the expanding cost paid over time.
Secondly, our expanded awareness also creates a gap between the event and my response. Within this gap, I discover a fork in the road – I can choose to continue to rerun the denial/distraction reaction or experiment with new responses, such as stepping into the moment. Exploring this new path, we may discover we are surprisingly capable of being amidst life’s to and fro. Even if we settle upon the rigidity route, actively choosing denial and distraction to make it through the event still leaves the door open for choosing self-compassion down the road.
Mindfulness invites us to free ourselves from the knee-jerk of rigidity, and to discover a fluidity in response to all that life offers - be it ups or downs and everything in between.
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balance
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