Stop Moving and Start Doing Nothing

My orginal intention when I started swimming regularly was as part of my personal fitness campaign. Whilst there have certainly been benefits in that area, I have found that, in fact, swimming has contributed as much to my wellbeing and my ability to take time out to think and reflect.

Swimming is a great all-round physical activity but it also providers matchless opportunities for relaxation. For example, have you ever suspended yourself motionless in a vertical position? I didn't realise this was actually possible until I tried it. Obviously, you need to keep your breathing passages clear of the water! There is something quite liberating about floating motionless: it's effortless and you have a sense of weightlessness as the water supports your body.

The other floating position I adopt is to just float horizontally with subtle movement of hands and feet to keep my body still and on the surface of the water. This, too, is a liberating experience.

I contemplated whilst undergoing one of these floating episodes that life could really benefit from a few regular pauses for stillness. We fill our lives with activity, be it family, work, social or otherwise. But do we give ourselves time and space to just stop and reflect? If not, why not? Does the idea scare us? Does it feel unnatural? Do we wonder what we would do?

One of the beauties of real friendship is the ability to actually be in the company of a friend and not feel compelled to say or do anything: just experiencing the enjoyment of each other's company. However, I suspect that even this is a rare experience for most people.

Our bodies need rest and relaxation. Yes, sleep, too. But rest and relaxation whilst awake is something that many of us deny ourselves. I don't even mean relaxing in front of the TV. I mean relaxation without any form of stimulus: the ability to say and do nothing.

I don't believe for a minute that our bodies were meant to be busy all of the time. I do believe that doing nothing is an investment - that giving ourselves a proper break actually benefits the times when we are busy. However, we have breakfast on the go - or not at all, a working lunch (if we're lucky) and dinner sometime at the end of the day but that, too, could be compromised.

How about:

a) getting up a little earlier and sitting down for a quiet, unrushed breakfast?

b) stopping for even just a short while in the middle of the day to sit down for a proper lunch?

c) making time to have an evening meal with someone important in our life at the end of the day?

d) taking time out to sit with a friend from time to time to enjoy a few idyllic moments together?

e) taking a swim and spending some of that just floating and enjoying the sensation of suspense?

I have had to make myself do some of these and I'm glad I'm doing it. I feel better for stopping and I especially feel better for doing nothing at times.


If you take time out, how do you achieve it? What works for you?

If you know you need to stop moving and start doing nothing, how are you going to make sure this happens?

Please feel free to comment.

Live for the purpose – not the performance.

Life is not a dress rehearsal.

(Anon)

Swimming is rarely a performance art.

It occurred to me whilst coursing (at my tediously slow pace) up and down our local pool the other night, that no one in the pool was engaged in a performance: there were plenty of swimmers - all, I guess, with a range of reasons for having got into the pool.

For my part, it is an attempt, at just a few years from 50, to keep trim. For others, it was a training exercise: be it an adult swimming lesson for those wishing to advance their skills - or a class of children at the early stages of developing this life skill. Still others came purely for the pleasure: a young couple spending time together, a pair of friends having a conversation whilst relaxing in the environs of the pool, a parent and child having a splash.

But no one was there to impress anyone else - or, if they were, they weren't succeeding because, quite frankly, no one is that much bothered about who else they are sharing the water with.

They're all there living the experience and, on the most part, enjoying it.

But how many people really live their lives like that?

I get slightly worried when I come across an individual whose life seems to be a performance - as if to bring attention to themselves - almost as if they have to justify their existence. I am not a psychologist but I would almost put this down to a personality disorder and suggest the individual in question seek professional help.

Life is not a performance! If it was, most of would cave in with the exhaustion of putting on the act. I am so grateful to friends who accept me as I am and allow me to be just me: that does mean, however, that, when I am feeling particularly relaxed in such company, my conversation or even behaviour might not be as intelligent as I might reserve for polite company. A recent example would be an evening I shared with a long-standing university friend: we ate, drank and shared jokes and stories - the laughter was unrestrained and the feeling enormously comfortable - in the middle of a Wetherspoons bar. We were not performing and, for that reason, not concerned about what anyone else might think of the joviality we shared. We were there for a purpose.

Live for the purpose not the performance.

You don’t have to justify yourself or excuse yourself. You don’t have to compare yourself or deny yourself. You just have to be yourself – living on purpose.

A few swimmers in the pool may well be preparing for a performance - a gala competition, a skills demonstration, an endurance test - but the preparation is just that: it’s preparation, in much the same way that life involves preparation for the occasional performance. The performance itself is brief and exhausting – we’re not designed to be constantly performing: we haven’t got that much adrenaline in reserve for a start. Instead, there are the bread-and-butter routines of life that get us up in the morning and even keep us awake at night. They are the purpose in our living.

Last night, I watched a TED video of Rick Warren, the writer of ‘The Purpose-Driven Life’. Rick says a lot in a few words and very much of what he says is quotable. I was particularly struck by something he said that aligned itself with what I had been mulling over whilst floating in the pool:

‘Life is not about looking good, feeling good or having the goods,

but about being good and doing good.’

Living FOR the purpose involves living ON purpose: you have a purpose in life and it’s not a performance. Rick also talks about having a ‘world view’: how you interpret the world and what your response is to it. Each of has a responsibility to live out our purpose and to make the most of what we have been given.

Someone, somewhere, quipped, ‘Life is not a dress rehearsal.’ It’s neither the dress rehearsal nor the performance: it’s the messy dressing room and the backstage clutter and the technical glitches. That’s the reality that those who are intent on performing forget.

What are you doing with what you’ve been given?

How do you know if you are living on purpose FOR a purpose?

Or do you feel that life is a performance and you’re weary with putting on an act?

Please feel free to leave your comments.

Phil