In a recent interview, I was asked the question, “How do you weave pause into your day?” My answer was I’ve been trying recently not to do anything else while I walk, drive, and cook. These are usually times when I listen to something – music, a podcast, an audiobook – or talk to someone.
At the start of my walk to work this morning, I was definitely not going for the pause. I was dictating emails and texts, making calls, and organizing my mental to do list.
When I took a break from my directed cognitive efforts, all sorts of things started to trickle in. The morning humidity conjured summer mornings in my grandparents’ St. Louis backyard. Muddy feet in streams poking about for crawdads. Heat from below meeting heat from above while tearing around a hard-top tennis court on a Big Wheel with a gaggle of cousins. Stinging nettles on bare calves. Those crazy styrofoam bubbles our parents made us strap on when swimming in a neighbor’s pool. Bats and fireflies – the fireflies!! – against the backdrop of night, grown-up voices, and cricket cacophony.
A pause in our efforts to steer the way can allow more of us, from more times and places, to inform our current agenda, identify our next steps, or maybe just enrich a current moment with additional layers of ourselves.
xo Jill