Do you also find it difficult to do nothing?
Just sitting still somewhere and recovering from the hustle and bustle of the day. I often long for this, because as an HSP, my head always seems to be overstimulated by something. But as soon as I sit down, my mind starts thinking of either useful or “more fun” activities. If I’m sitting here anyway, I might as well do a load of laundry. Or I pick up my phone to check my social media. Or I think about what I can prepare for dinner so that I don’t have to stress about it later. Wasn’t I reading a book? Or… finally time for that magazine. My mind is working overtime and it simply doesn’t occur to me that doing nothing is the best option at that moment. Something I wanted so badly two minutes ago! Because doing nothing feels like a waste of my scarce time in my busy everyday life. Why is it so difficult to just be still? Both psychology and the Clarity process provide answers to this question. And I immersed myself in the practice of doing nothing, through a retreat with lots of silence and doing nothing.
Various psychological schools of thought suggest that our minds are accustomed to being constantly active. We think, plan, analyse and compare – often without even realising it. As soon as there is no external stimulus, your inner subconscious takes over. In neuroscience, this is called the Default Mode Network: a brain network that becomes active when we are not consciously engaged in anything. It causes us to worry or daydream. It seems as if we cannot stop thinking. In addition, behavioural scientists have shown that our brains are trained to do something because action often yields immediate rewards (in the form of dopamine, also known as the happiness hormone). ‘Doing nothing’ does not yield immediate rewards — or even a slight punishment in the form of unpleasant feelings of boredom or anxiety.
The Clarity exercises I do myself and with my clients help all of us to see that this is not our fault, but the result of conditioning. From an early age, we learn that we have to do something to be valuable. When we are busy, we do not get in the way of adults going about their business. ‘Do your best.’ ‘Keep busy.’ ‘Use your time wisely.’ These beliefs become so self-evident that we no longer question them. By examining your conditioning, you can become more aware of it and decide to ignore it. And then just take a nice rest!
Because doing nothing is not lazy. In fact, it is an opportunity to free yourself from those unconscious patterns. When we stop doing, there is space to see what is really going on in our minds and bodies: tensions, desires, beliefs. The creator of the Clarity Process, Jeru Kabal, put it so beautifully:
‘You don’t have to change anything, you just have to see what is there.’
When you succeed in doing that, you become calmer, your body relaxes, and you experience a natural state of being that is not so dependent on doing or achieving things. But doing nothing does take courage. It is an exercise in trust — that life goes on, even when we are not steering it for a moment.
That’s why I spent the last two weeks at a Clarity master retreat in beautiful Italy, to practise this myself once again. Because there, we did an awful lot and at the same time very little. We spent a lot of time in silence and nature. And worse still (according to my conditioned mind): after some shorter exercises one day, we were instructed to do absolutely ‘nothing’ for hours! Every day we were sent out into nature for longer periods of time, with only six sentences to repeat when our thoughts took over again. Of course, there was lunch and dinner that we were allowed to attend (in silence), but otherwise we were instructed to do as little as possible. It was just after ten o’clock and we wouldn’t be meeting again until 8 p.m. Not a beginner’s exercise, I can tell you. But loyal as I am to assignments (also a conditioning, by the way), I obediently went to find a spot.
And so an hour passed, then another hour… I have never been so happy that it was lunchtime. When I sat down in the same spot again afterwards, my WASTING TIME-programme really kicked in. What’s the point of this? I should have skipped this workshop and caught up on my overdue work. Why am I doing this to myself? I looked at my watch a thousand times, while my thoughts continued to race. But by observing myself during this “time wasting”, I also noticed how relaxed my body became. Every hour, my shoulders seemed to drop further. Apparently, this was unrelated to the immense frustration in my head. Until it became clear that I didn’t have to solve anything at that moment.
And so, during those weeks, I learned to have compassion for my own conditioning. My mind can’t help always wanting to move forward. Sometimes I listen to it, and sometimes I choose to ignore my thoughts for a while. It’s still not easy, but practice makes perfect.
Would you like to practice yourself:
Take a few minutes today to do nothing.
No meditation, no breathing exercises, no goal.
Just be.
Feel what happens. Observe the urge to do something again — and smile at it.
That is clarity in action.
If it doesn’t work, don’t give up right away.
That’s just how the mind is programmed. And if you want, I can help you gain clarity about your conditioning, so you can better see what is preventing you from taking your rest. I’m happy to help!
