I recently spent a couple days at my mother’s house where I love to go unwind and do literally nothing.
I went alone and had an amazing time with just her and my stepdad.
I sat out for long periods on the porch, watched movies and ate great food with my mom.
We had some great conversations and planned some more vacation time together.
As it got later though, I realized that I was alone in the quiet house and felt a little uneasy as I realized I was just going to sit and think alone with literally no entertainment or distractions for a bit.
I’m sitting there and I keep picking up my phone to scroll through nothing new and important.
I decide that I want to understand why I am resisting the quiet time and so I just close my eyes and sit with it for a minute.
Minutes and hours blend together while I move through space, time, and emotion in my mind.
I had a couple realizations that I found very valuable and possibly helpful to others.
I remembered a study I had read about previously where subjects were put into a room with nothing to do.
The only thing in the room was a button that each person could push to self inflict an electric shock that they had all experienced beforehand and said was unpleasant.
In fact, each person admitted to being willing to pay money to not have the shock administered.
However, as each person sat in the room, 67% of men and 25% of women shocked themselves.
They were literally shocking themselves instead of sitting in the room quietly with their own thoughts and nothing to do.
How could this be?
Why is doing nothing in silence so difficult?
I decided that I wasn’t alone in feeling this way.
I first realized that I am addicted to being busy.
I have a chemical dependence on being productive or at least distracted.
It almost sounds cliche to say be present, but I often miss what is happening around me right now because my mind is elsewhere on something that can wait or doesn’t really deserve my attention at all.
The deeper and darker realization came when I started to realize I didn’t want to feel the emotions that were headed my way.
These are painful emotions about choices and hardships.
I still have sad feelings about my divorce and the changes in my life from that.
I am adjusting to being alone still and even worse are the thoughts I feel when I think about the pain my ex-wife feels from me deciding to end the marriage.
I feel like I blindsided her and it was a terrible surprise.
To understand myself completely I need to know that I am perfectly capable of making decisions that hurt people I care about.
Not only capable, but that I willingly make them.
Also, the quiet time brings out the feelings of traits that I feel ashamed about or don’t want to admit are there.
For example, I am ambitious and I have an incredible work ethic.
However, I often pursue certain goals to the detriment of my physical and mental health.
And, for the same reasons, I neglect people in my life who love and care about me.
Everything balances out in its own way.
The truth is that everyone has equal light and dark.
The one cannot exist without the other.
I find that I try to hide or dismiss those qualities about myself because I don’t like them or I am worried people will judge me for them, but they are just as much a part of me as the traits I deem “good” or “desirable”.
The negative traits serve me just as much the positive ones.
The positive traits have just as many drawback as the negative ones.
They are a beautiful part of the whole.
Understanding this about myself allows me to operate with a clear head and have confidence in myself.
I am not bogged down by guilt or shame.
I have read many biographies and autobiographies of successful people and in every single case, the person had weaknesses and challenges.
Those same challenges and weaknesses served as the reason that propelled them to success.
It was what catapulted them to where they wanted to be.
Success is not due to lack of challenge.
Typically, success happens in spite of challenge.
It is a necessary part of it.
Take some time for yourself.
Get away from any people or distractions and just BE for a little while.
Whatever thoughts and feelings start to creep in, let them come and sit with them.
Analyze what is happening and realize that it is a part of you.
Maybe you will hate those things about yourself, but just know that the light is also there.
It exists inside you or else the darkness could not be there too.
Let them both be there and be content with it.
One of my favorite quotes from Wayne Dyer reads:
Everything that’s created comes out of silence.
Your thoughts emerge from the nothingness of silence,
Your words come out of this void.
Your very essence emerged from emptiness.
All creativity requires some stillness.
Thank you for reading.
Phillip Adams