· Open my physical mail 1-2 days after I get it.
It’s all bills, bureaucratic, or administrative stuff anyway, and it doesn’t make a difference whether I know right now or tomorrow. This trick gives me power over my time back. It gives me the chance to learn what the matter is when I’m mentally prepared to address the issue. It says to the “thing”: my time and my peace of mind are more important than you. And it removes me from the “rush” mentality, where everything must be dealt with NOW. The fact is, there will ALWAYS be something demanding my attention. It’s never, “let’s get this over with so I can focus on myself later.” It doesn’t work like that because by the time I’m done dealing with this thing and the ones that inevitably follow, I have no energy left to focus on myself. The truth is, no one is dying if I don’t open this letter right here right now. So, the letter will wait until I decide it’s time to open it.
·
Set my phone on “do not
disturb” when I’m doing something and I don’t want to be interrupted.
A couple very
selected numbers can “disturb” me any time (and they usually don’t!). Everyone
else can and will wait. Wait until this work is finished, wait until my reading
time is over, wait until I get out of the gym, wait until my time with this
friend is over, when I’m finished eating, done with the laundry… there is no
hierarchy of activities, and what I wholeheartedly devote my time to is my
business and mine alone; no one gets to judge whether something is too trivial
for me to postpone replying to a text. If and when I want to focus on something
or someone, it’s my choice and I am going to protect it. It’s NEVER a matter of
life and death anyway. And honestly, no one is entitled to my time; I really
don’t have to drop everything at any given time to reply to texts or phone
calls. I’ll get to it when it suits me (just as the sender/caller texted or
called me when it suited them, by the way). The “urgent” things
that need to be done “by yesterday” are not real.
·
Spend my time on something
that is not profitable.
Not everything
must be a commodity, not everything must be converted into money. Time is NOT
money. I can take time to just be in nature, read a novel, crochet silly
things, play with my cats, sleep.
What has all
this accomplished?
I feel more in
charge of my time and my life. I don’t feel guilty anymore for “wasting time”
doing “unaccountable” stuff. My attention is not split over several different
things/people at the same time, so when I focus on something or someone, I can
give it or them my full attention. My mind feels more relaxed and peaceful. I
enjoy things on a deeper level because there’s no expectation attached that
they should profit me somehow. And guess what? No one has died in the meantime,
especially not because I replied to a text after 3 hours. Shocking, huh?
I’m so sick and tired of this “hustle” and “fast-paced” mentality. It
adds nothing to my life and actually robs it of the chance to truly enjoy it. I
am the kind of person who stops walking when she sees a nice flower, a duck in
the pond, a funny-looking cloud in the sky, a butterfly zigzagging through my
potted plants. The kind of person who steps onto the balcony in a freezing winter
night to look at the moon because it is so beautiful. The kind of person who
walks farther than she needs to because there’s a wonderful sunset and she
wants to find a spot where she can admire it better. I reclaim my right to
spend my time on these activities without feeling guilty about not being
“efficient.”
Have my problems and my worries magically disappeared since I’ve started doing all the above?
Sadly, no. But they don’t own me anymore, and it’s best to approach
these things with serenity rather than with anxiety, isn’t it? As Marcus
Aurelius said: The nearer a man comes to a calm
mind, the closer he is to strength. And if that’s
not enough, there’s a Zen proverb that says: To be calm is the highest
achievement of the self.
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