Doing Nothing
Predicted to come out as one of the top health and wellness trends this year is….drumroll please…..NOTHING! Might seem a bit anticlimactic at first, but believe it or not it actually is a thing - and I’d be willing to bet that people will be spending all sorts of money to help them do it.
You see, doing nothing is harder than it sounds. I’m not talking about the kind of “nothing” that is sitting on the couch scrolling on your phone or watching TV. Doing nothing as a wellness strategy is very different than the mindless entertainment sort of nothing that refers to us accomplishing zero, but still doing something to fill that time. More than ever before, our world has shifted towards instant gratification and the constant need to be entertained - so much so that our attention span is now a little bit shorter than that of a goldfish. It only takes a few seconds before the average person’s mind wanders or begins to shift focus. We may be listening to someone, but in no time at all we start another stream of consciousness on the side, or perhaps start planning what we might like to say next - or maybe what we’d like for dinner. We have been trained, mostly by technology, to expect instant feedback and reward and get impatient when a computer doesn’t spit out what we wanted in a fraction of a second.
Compare this to the fairly recent “old days” when we had to make our own fun outside, wait idly in a doctor’s office, a line up, or for someone who was running late but had no way of letting us know. Reward was not instant; you’d often have to set up a game, perhaps build something, go through a process, and only then would you get to enjoy it. If we wanted to learn about something we needed to go to the library, search through the dreaded drawers of cards, and then hunt around the shelves until we eventually (hopefully) found the book. No instant google or AI to bring it to our fingertips. Oh and then the internet did come…but dial up certainly was a far cry from the high speed of today. We all got very used to the hourglass and the painfully slow loading of an image. Want to hear your fav song on repeat? You’d be sitting by the radio for hours waiting for it to come on so you could hit record on the ol tape deck. Road trip? Hope you like staring out the window! Yes, patience, waiting and a bit of down time was just part of life, but inconvenient as it may have been at times, hidden in there was the skill of learning the ability to just be. We’ve lost that now, and could do our body and our mind a favour to re-learn the skill.
The truth is, a lot of people get very uncomfortable doing nothing. When we wait for something, we wait with entertainment, especially kids. While there are times that technology can be a saving grace, we should also spend a little time teaching them what it’s like to be bored and what it’s like to do nothing. When we are doing nothing, it allows the mind to sit quietly and it allows our hormones a chance to settle rather than always seeking the dopamine and adrenalin rush from the instant rewards of high speed games and video. Some people are so used to having high amounts of cortisol (the stress hormone) coursing through their veins that they become unaware that they are addicted to the anxiety that can go with it. Learning to do nothing - in a mindful way, can help us break free of these patterns and give us room to breathe!
Because “nothing” doesn’t sound very cool, the wellness trend of doing nothing has been termed “Dolce Far Niente”, which is Italian for “the sweetness of doing nothing”. Sounds much fancier don’t you think?! I mean I might not be looking to shell out money for nothing, but I sure am down to pay for dolce far niente! The idea is to pare down on our overscheduled, overworked, and overstimulated lives, find the balance again, and enjoy the rest and benefits that true relaxation has to offer. Mindfully doing nothing gives us the opportunity to slow down and enjoy the present, take a breath, listen to our body and simmer the stress hormones. It’s perhaps one of the unspoken joys of camping - the doing nothing that inevitably comes with no cell service, no TV and no internet (once you’ve finished all your campsite puttering of course ;). It’s also part of the magic of just sitting by the campfire, watching the flames dance for hours. Being able to do nothing is one of the main reasons people are attracted to spas - the guilt-free ability to just…be.
So perhaps the money in this wellness trend has very little to do with our actual ability to do nothing but has a whole lot more to do with providing us the “excuse” to do nothing (a permission we seem to to think we need). After all, how can we be at the beck and call of the office if we don’t have reception or if cell phones “aren’t allowed” there? Altering our environment to encourage relaxation with calming music, smells, or white robes and slippers can certainly help, but don’t convince yourself it’s required. The truth is, you don’t need to spend money to give yourself the permission to do nothing. You don’t need that fancy spa or retreat (or even a campsite) to do it. Of course, if you want to and you have the ability then by all means enjoy! But don’t wait around for that once a year or once a decade spa visit to come around, start now by making a little bit of nothing a priority. It’ll be awkward at first as all new things are, but you might be surprised at the benefits to your mind and body by carving out a little bit of time to do nothing every day - or at least every week. It’s a great space to practice breathing techniques, clear your mind, meditate, or just enjoy your present surroundings. If you think you don’t have time then at the very least, the next time you find yourself waiting for something or someone, challenge yourself to survive without entertainment or multi-tasking. The harder it is for you to do that, the more “nothing” you probably need!