“So what you doing this weekend”, my well-meaning colleague asked.
“Nothing”, I replied
“Really. you need to get a life”, pat came the reply.
I was stunned. Which part of my ‘Nothing’ gave away the impression I did
not have a life. While pondering over it, I realised the art of doing nothing
is slowly getting lost. One of my very fond childhood memories is of the hot
afternoons (mostly during summer vacation) I spent lounging in the garden,
doing nothing, just listening to the birds chirping, and street vendors calling
out their different fares. My young mind was lulled into ‘nothingness’ as I breathed
in the heady aroma of the jasmine flowers mixed with the hot damp smell of my
beloved city; Kolkata.
But kids nowadays are not allowed to indulge in ‘nothingness’. Every second
and every minute of their life must be filled with a purpose. French class,
guitar lessons, swimming, drawing classes, Cuemath, Kumon, horse-riding, etc,
fill in their days in a way that they do not find the time to do the most
important things human beings are capable of doing: Observe, Think (on your
own) and Feel. When I take my 3 year old to the neighbourhood park, I’m always
greeted with the oft familiar picture of mothers pulling and pushing their kids
on rides one after the other. If any kid is found standing in a corner and
staring into ‘nothingness’, the parent is promptly by their side trying to coax
him/her to the slide, or the swing, or the seesaw, because the one hour spent
in the park MUST be spent doing what they are supposed to do, Play and have fun.
We new-age parents take fun seriously too.
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.
Well, what can I say, William Henry Davies must have owned a time
machine. When was the last time you stood and saw a single, beautiful, forlorn
flower slowly fall down the branch in rhythmic twirly movement and
ever-so-gently hit the ground? I do not remember when.
I’m an inherently restless person, and there was a time in life when I too
was busy filling in my days with ‘purposeful tasks’. But then divine
intervention happened, in the form of my husband. Kunal taught me the value of ‘not
doing anything’. How by not doing anything you can connect better with your own
self, and achieve a sense of fulfilment and peace which no amount of busy
schedules can give you. Honestly, the busier your schedule gets, the deeper the
void inside you becomes.
Since I have experienced this journey from being restless to mindful,
this state of nothingness impacts me more intensely. When I say mindful, I’m painfully
aware that I’m nowhere close to be an absolute mindful person. My journey has
just begun and I’m somehow flailing my arms, gasping and trying to stay afloat.
Because mindfulness is a tough nut to crack, especially in a society like ours
where ‘being busy’ is perceived as the cool thing, and ‘doing nothing’ is stuff
losers do.
My recent tryst with Yoga nidra reinforced my belief in the power of ‘not
doing anything, except being present at the moment’. I will not exaggerate if I
say that Yoga nidra changed something deep down inside me. When I learned about
the concept of Yoga nidra, I laughed. So I have to pay for a class and go and
sleep there, really!!! I’m a super-exhausted working mother of a toddler, all I
need to sleep is 40 seconds of silence. But of course Yoga nidra is so much
more than sleeping. Yoga nidra to me is an absolute means of attaining a state
of consciousness, where your mind and soul is ready to feel and realise the
truth we otherwise would never fathom with our mortal senses. Nothing in life
has helped me connect with myself more than this practice. This practice has
made me lead life more slowly and meaningfully. What have I achieved out of that?
Well, the leaves seem more greener, the person sitting across me more humane
and my heart happier. It is a little gain, but so totally worth it 😊
