The Paradox: Do nothing to restore your sense of wellbeing

Do nothing for a day. Clean your head to create space for clarity, creativity, and as a side effect, you may also reduce your carbon footprint, at least for this day of nothingness. Our modern urban hectic lifestyles often push us to our limits. If being ceaselessly active and productive makes you feel good, keeps your life in balance (which is highly unlikely since hyperactivity drains energy according to the rules of physics) and does not harm or deprive the people around you (harmonious relationships make us happier), keep going. Otherwise, if you sense that you are losing track and life’s purpose masks itself in hazy distance, keep reading as you probably need grounding, at least, a bit.

Imagine a train speeding in front of you and you are running after it, in vain, attempting to reach happiness or success, either of these desires being transferred inside the train’s wagons. Now, you feel like you are loosing the strength to run, you cannot accelerate anymore.
You might think that it is time to stop, and perhaps wait for the next train and hope it will match your own ability to run alongside it and board anytime. In my poem See Sea I dress the awareness of becoming. Yet, this is the train of life and the tracks are setting its direction, so now you must think thoroughly about ‘How do I catch my real, happy life, the train with a more enjoyable landscape going in a pace that allows me to savour the journey (beyond its certain destination, the obvious necessity – the death)?’

Here are some solutions that worked for me and you can to start with:
First of all, you must learn how to be consciously here, aware of NOW.
Assess your state of consciousness.
What are you not aware of? The sounds, smells, physical things, taste, your thoughts…
What did you choose to focus on instead?

Any emotions creep out?

What are these and why do you feel them?

Recently, I stayed at a countryside ryokan, a traditional Japanese inn where calm, reflection, connection to nature, ourselves and the terrestrial human existence resurface from the overcrowded inner space of our modern psyche. While dipping deep into the hot spring bath daily, the steam purified my skin as well as my thinking. A genuine, thorough and meaningful sense of spiritual bliss suddenly descended from the surrounding forest upon my mind.

I realised that sometimes in doing nothing we can achieve more than through vigour and planned activity. The ropes of anxiety suddenly loosen up and we are freed to do and embrace what is truly important and fulfilling. We regain the sense of wellbeing we had lost.
Further, we learn more about ourselves by going deep. Not just floating on the surface, but diving in to discover the immense potential existing in the psyche’s deep waters. For such an enlightening experience we have to reserve time. Making ourselves looking constantly busy is like a disease that rarely benefits anyone in the long shot and people who matter are turned off.
Millenia of knowledge and experience in support of slowing down

Most of the leading religions grasped the millennial wisdom of the crucial impact of reflection and relaxation.

The individual’s relaxed state influences also our collective social well-being. Reserving one day each week for rest and family makes one a more whole person as well. Christians have Sundays, Jews Sabbath, Muslims Fridays, and Buddhists meditate daily. It is essential for humanity’s sanity to be with your loved ones and with yourself free from work and the usual daily life distractions. The doors to your inner world of thoughts, desires and dreams are open. By going to the church or just praying collectively or alone, we can create a meaningful silent conversation between oneself and the divine. The non-committed to any faith need to include self-reflection and a labor-free day in order to be in peace with one’s mind and the changing world.

Aside religions, many cultures have established social acceptance of nothingness.
Far niente, the Italians are known to employ the sweet secret of enjoying the moment in their lifestyle. Guilt-free and nonchalant. Across the border, the French paradox may not just dwell in imbibing bottles of wine, incessantly smoking while only nibbling on pain with foie gras or fromage, but in their enviable two-hours lasting lunch breaks and space reserved for friends and family.
No rush, calm down your stress hormones, soften the heartbeat and install awareness of shared existence. The long-living people of the blue zones, that I wrote about in my first musing, do not rush anywhere. Their pace of living is manageable as they find satisfaction in their natural surroundings – from the islands of Okinawa through Sardinia to the laidback Costa Ricans, healthy centenarians are an ordinary presence.
Eastern philosophies now popular in the fatigued West highlight nothingness as the path to ultimate wellbeing. From Tao in China through Zen in Japan to the Buddhist Laos and Thailand, inertia is praised over intervention with the nature’s status quo.

Sophisticated ancient wisdom applied to today’s life

The essence of zen is to blend in within the landscape (our surroundings), which also means adhering to the “original state”. That may well mean that by excessive activity and unnecessary change we divert ourselves too much from our original self and our root place in the world. This can skew tremendously the balance scale of existence as we know it. Yin and yang still curl into the modern beings’ consciousness as the ultimate answers to a satisfied life. Through reflecting upon oneself and emptying the mind as happens during meditation and mindful observation our untapped wisdom awakens.
On your day of nothingness, you flow, like a warm summer breeze, smoothly through the waves of hours, no commitments. If you encounter any setbacks then the following ‘grounders’ can help, they are the rocks you can grasp or lean on for support.

Tea drinking in its natural simplicity and slow motion with your hands can facilitate the entrance inside one’s self.
Walk, hike or swim in nature. In a busy city, one needs a calm area, a park, an early Sunday morning before the crowds arrive.
Emptiness, simple design and spare floral or plant decoration can become helpful triggers to rest the flickering mind.

Architecture which has strong zen spirit aims to create a “pause” for the passers-by in the modern hectic environment (the Aman hotels’ secret is out). Xi Wen Tai, a Taiwanese architect and lecturer, took the concept of the Buddhist “three doors” into his creation of contemporary temple in the commercial zone of the city of Taichung. The building captured the three phrases in Buddhism that stand for wisdom, compassion and relief which are also the three doors to escaping from worldly worries.

A simple addition of a fish pond in front of a restaurant or creating an airy and spacious entrance lobby in a building also can relieve human sorrows, if just for the moment.

Art wields an immense power over our minds, so we can use it to tune into the nothingness of the day.
Stopping and experiencing our surroundings, the view from the window, the freshness of the air jetting through our lungs, the texture of skin, the material we wear, softness of the chair we sit on. Exploring our sensations teaches us as much as a good book.

If you still crave outer knowledge, then research any topic that really interests you. Work or ticking offs on your must-do-lists are off the “no schedule” day. Instead, indulge in pursuing your genuine interest that you would otherwise neglect because of its ‘unproductive’ character. Taste the differences between the salt around the world, birds in Florida, photography, poetry, endangered species or tribes, anything that rises your own curiosity.
On the day of nothingness, think about your placement on the Earth, your connections and interactions with nature and the world at large. Is your lifestyle sustainable? Are you being too selfish? What about the future generations? Perhaps, only loving parents can understand this concern, but if you connect with the environment, you will too.

Do nothing: Good for our planet, good for us

As the climate talks in Parisian 2015 reached the binding commitment (for how long? sigh) of our mutual responsibility for the Planet, each of us can contribute to common wellbeing by incorporating a day of nothingness into our weekly schedules. No cars, planes, cooking on heat, meat and processed foods, chemical cosmetics, biodegradable instead of plastic packaging, imported goods from faraway countries and above all no shopping. Buying new garments and gadgets which one does not need but rather just want, pollutes the world in a sneaky manner. Apparel production, constant release of the upgraded hardware and marketing to buying new things without needing them, adds scars to our dirty environmental destruction. As the global pandemic reduced our footprint, so shall we remember that keeping some of the reduced activities was good for clarifying our values.

More stuff also pollutes the mind. Having too much to choose from, busies us with vanities. In what we are told to believe that nourishes and improves our wellness may do us more damage than good. In a recent opinion piece of the International New York Times, Nicholas Kristof, pointed at the danger of multiple unregulated chemicals in our daily lives that are now being proved to harm us. These endocrine disrupting, artificial substances were linked to altering healthy reproduction, affecting diabetes and various cancers. Reportedly, your clothes, cosmetics, furniture, cleaning products and even your grocery receipts are tainted by these invisible toxins! Now, your and your family’s health is in danger and you won’t undo by just eating organic. These studies were published in the British Medical Journal and other respectable outlets, trust them. Living green is better for our health.

As I am finishing this editorial, I am swinging in a hammock, surrounded by beach gardenias, coconut palms and curious lizards. Listening to the ocean whistling into a steady stream of water in my background, I am happily captured in this space of nothingness. I just landed in the Maldives, the 800km stretch of coral reef islets in the wildness of the Indian Ocean. The situation lends itself to doing nothing. Read more about my ayurvedic balancing retreat in the Maldives.

Sure, where one can find peace more easily than in the full embrace of nature? The Earth remains for all humanity the grounding medium of our inner peace. Yet, it is the mind, the strength of our thoughts that can transfer us to this earthly paradise without needing to be physically present. While, most of us cannot escape the urban factory of hyperactivity, we should regularly try at least mentally to do nothing for our own good, even the kids need a brain break. Zoom out to zoom in.