When life gets more stressful, I become more devoted to the smaller rituals. Laundry. Ironing. Gardening. Feeding the sourdough starter. Walking the dogs. Folding towels. Watering something that is growing. Weeding…and then flower arranging, dreaming, hoping…and before you know it – enthusiasm arrives again!
These are not particularly impressive activities. They do not belong on a résumé. They are not urgent. They do not generate deliverables. And yet, I have come to believe they may be some of the most productive things I do.
Most of us are taught we are to do these mundane tasks as quickly as possibly – to get them over with – to go be social, or accomplished or important.
No. These tasks ARE the thing. It IS your life. And it is a wonderful way to practice BEING IN it.
Chores are life’s way of making sure we meditate. Xo.
When we are under pressure, our instinct is often to push harder. Think more. Work longer. Solve the problem. Answer the email. Make the decision. Reach.
Again – no. Rest. Make space. And then begin again.
The mind does not always do its best work when we are staring directly at a problem.
Sometimes it needs white space.
There is something deeply settling about giving your hands a simple task while allowing your mind to wander. Kneading dough. Pulling weeds. Ironing a shirt. Folding laundry. These activities occupy just enough of the conscious mind to quiet the noise, while leaving the rest of us free to think in a different way.
Our deeper well of knowledge, with roots in our gut instinct that was quietly logging each and every move, cue and data point from the week, has much to report.
Ideas connect. Problems rearrange themselves. Creativity returns. Solutions arise…as surprise thoughts. Revelations even.
The subconscious needs room to do its best work.
This is one reason so many highly creative people, entrepreneurs and leaders deliberately protect stretches of time in which they appear to be doing very little. Some of the most valuable thinking happens away from the meeting, the computer and the constant stream of incoming information.
The hours that look the least productive can sometimes produce the clearest thinking.
In addition to white space and rest, I have also learned to organize parts of my life around seasons. I find being in sync with nature helps to solidify our foundation and center. It is very grounding to eat and move with the seasons. Let nature help you. Respect the natural flow of your biological and neurological wiring and dance to the notes being played by the Universe…it is much better than your tiny willful antics.
There is something reassuring about allowing the calendar of the natural world to dictate a few of our rhythms instead of allowing every rhythm to be dictated by work.
For me, the first day of fall means the sourdough starter gets started.
All pun intended.
Once the weather begins to turn, that little jar becomes part of my weekly ritual. On Thursday night, I take the starter out of the refrigerator. On Friday and Saturday, I feed it and bring it back to life. Then I make the dough, give it the long, slow time it needs to rise, and by Sunday evening there is warm bread coming out of the oven for the week ahead.
Nothing about sourdough can really be rushed.
That is part of its charm.
It asks you to pay attention, but not obsessively. It asks you to participate, but also to wait. And somewhere in that waiting, I begin to shift. To settle. To accept. And relax. I come home to myself – and await a house that smells like fresh baked bread and dive into the comfort only a fresh loaf can provide.
During the week, so much of my attention moves outward. Toward students. Clients. Artists. Politicians. Foundations. Service Work. Projects. Problems. Deadlines. People who need something from me.
The weekend becomes a deliberate movement inward.
Home. Hearth. Food. Garden. Dogs. Rest.
I take care of my sweet little pack and make sure the pups get the extra time and attention that busy weekdays do not always allow. We spend more time outside. More time in nature. More time simply being together.
And I remember that nurturing a life is also work.
Not work in the exhausting sense.
Work in the oldest sense of the word: tending.
Tending the garden. Tending the house. Tending the animals we love. Tending the food that will nourish us. Tending our own interior lives.
There is a profound difference between distraction and restoration. Mindlessly scrolling for an hour may help us escape our thoughts. A quiet ritual often helps us return to them in a gentler, more spacious way.
That is where some of my best ideas arrive. Not because I sat down and demanded that I be creative. Because I stopped demanding anything at all. I washed something. I watered something. I kneaded something. I walked outside with the dogs.And I made enough room for my mind to find me again. Perhaps that is one of the quiet lessons of a seasonal life.
We do not always need to push forward. Sometimes we need to tend what is already here. And sometimes, while we are doing what appears to be very little, something important inside us is finally getting done.
So, yes, use discipline to execute. Be efficient. Competent. Reliable. But use that same discipline to carve out and protect intentional times of rest when you do “nothing”, especially in rhythm with nature and its cycles – I think you will find this will be your most prodcutive, fruitful and meaningful time spent yet.
