The Power of Pressing Pause
Many of us are obsessed with ascending when we haven’t mastered grounding….
I am, and forever will be, a Questing Beast. I want to make the most of this lifecycle; learning, evolving, realising my potential. For the last two decades, “catching myself coming back in the opposite direction” is a rhythm I often run. I take pride in the amount that I can manage, but recent events have literally made me lie down and I now see that I’ve been missing a trick.
I am not sick; this was a self-inflicted injury from pushing myself too far physically. I am grateful for the universal course correction - i.e. “Sit down. Take a breath”. I value self care and simple pleasures greatly, but my healing process has been lying horizontal and doing absolutely nothing. This is something different and more profound.
As a doer I found enforced downtime, to this extreme, difficult. I’ve never had the patience for meditation - I get the irony – but as one of my wise friends advised, just lean into the stillness. (Thank you so much Charlotte).
That stillness does not come from brushing-up-on-chess-and-reading-Wuthering-Heights-and-completing-my-Irish-Citizenship-and-clearing-my-admin list-and-and-and-and-and-and… BREATHE! With a brain that runs at a million miles an hour, and a rhythm tuned to multiple demands, it took me a minute (and two series of L’Agence Paris) to chew through the excess thoughts and concerns about what I should be doing, to finally succumb.
Stillness came from watching the antics of two plump squirrels, and an outlandishly glossy magpie, in the tree outside my window, from the sanctuary of my bed. That’s. It.
Self-care reinforces your value; stillness reinforces your self-belief.
Sage advice from a dear friend was to take advantage of the “rest you’d never get without reconstructive surgery”. Right there - Reconstructive. That’s exactly what complete stillness affords you. It pairs everything back. It lets your mind wander freely through the corridors of your unconsciousness, presenting memories and patterns, space and clarity, focus and creativity. It lights the pathway ahead. I see that loop, it's that direction I want, that’s not for me, how did I not see that opportunity, this is important, just let that go now. It is a place for epiphanies.
With the many moving parts of life, I know that making space for this stillness comes as a luxury. It also takes a lot to be still. Not just because of the stream of low-level “info” perpetually blasted at us, but because being absolutely still - quiet mind, at peace with who you are in your own company - can be an uncomfortable process. It’s quite common for people to schedule every inch of life, or constantly surround themselves with others, to avoid being alone with their “stuff”.
We could learn a lot from the Nordic tradition of Hygge (Hyoo-guh), a quiet space for comfort and contemplation. An opportunity for fresh thinking, new ideas and direction. It’s a shame that we don’t have this in English culture, but having wholeheartedly uncovered its value, it is a ritual I will be taking forward.
