The Undeniable Power of the Pause
By: Roshan Daryanani
Tags: Rest, Peace, Happiness, Relaxation, Productivity

Let’s take the humble number one.

Seemingly, it’s not worth much on its own.

Add a zero and its value goes up.

Add a few more zeroes, and its might increases even further.

Can we achieve the same effect by adding blank space to our days?

We’ve all heard about famous people whose success is partly attributed to secret power-naps but somehow feel that this does not apply to us.

We live in an age where taking a time-out from work and chores is optional. Struggling to fit in respite is normal, even something to be lauded. Even if you haven’t chosen to worship at the altar of Maximum Efficiency at All Times, there is often a niggling sensation at the back of your mind that you should be doing something.

All the same, you’ve read the research — you know that taking breaks will benefit your health, your sanity and yes, even your productivity.

So why then, don’t you take them?

It may be because:

a) You don’t know how.

Most breaks appear to be pointless not simply in terms of what they allow you to accomplish, but also in terms of how they fail to make your life better.

Let’s face it, if you’d found a way to take a breather that was truly refreshing and restorative, your daily schedule would have more breaks in it than a teenage boys’ choir session.

b) Part of you is scared.

Perhaps you’re scared of what you’d discover if you stopped for a while. A break might make you question the value of what you’re doing. Maybe you’d feel you simply couldn’t go back to your task or your job or the country you live in.

These are valid concerns. Let’s address them.

a) You can re-learn how to take breaks that you actually enjoy.

No matter how frazzled your brain is, their is a form of down-time that you will enjoy, if you can find the right one.

During a recent few days spent in a quiet village with a population of 276 inhabitants (a mere 30,000 times smaller than the population of London, my current home town) a few things became started to become clear, not the least of which was my tumultuous mind.

Changing your environment can go a long way in helping your brain to relax. As highlighted by an episode of The Unmistakable Creative, one of my favourite podcasts, your ‘9 environments’ play a vital role in helping you feel inspired (or not). These include, by the way, things like your body and financial situation.

If you experiment a little, you might find a surprising variety of things that help you to feel rested. Here’s a few things that worked for me recently:

Getting together at a friends’ home for a karaoke session, watching them belt their hearts out to ‘Hakuna Matata’ and joining in

Eating lunch on a grassy lawn while having a chat

Spending time browsing at the library

Enjoying a home-cooked meal

Writing a letter to a friend

Crafting this article

Breaks don’t have to feel bland and lifeless.

Let’s revisit the powerful little zeroes from before:

Each one of these ‘breaks’ is starting to take its own shape and colour in my mind.

One of them is glowing sun, warming me up and helping me to feel energized.

Another is a hot air balloon, lifting me far up above a harried world so that I don’t lose sight of the big picture.

The last one is my favourite — a warm cookie with molten chocolate chips that makes life a lot sweeter.

Introducing the new donut cookie plus cookie hole

Experiment with ways to make your breaks fun. They might involve curling up on a sofa and calling an old friend, or going for a walk with your favourite podcast, or spreading out your limbs somewhere comfy while listening to something soothing (thanks Kristi Keller for the suggestion).

Whatever you choose, make sure your breaks are long enough. The measly three minutes you give yourself to go to the bathroom may not be enough to help your brain to switch off.

b) Taking a step back can bring to light uncomfortable truths. What then?

There is a risk associated with creating more space in your life.

Putting aside your tasks and other distractions and taking a few deep breaths can uncover any dissatisfaction and angst you feel about your current situation.

Why am I still doing this job? Should I move to another country? Do I need to worry about this constant feeling of tiredness?

Is life getting away from me without my having much of an impact on the world?

Most of us have to face such questions at some point, and it can be very disquieting. If there is an easy way to answer them, I haven’t come across it yet.

Interestingly though, while giving yourself some breathing room allows these difficult questions to bubble up in your consciousness, giving yourself more of that very same breathing room can help you answer them, albeit in unexpected ways.

What if, when facing a conundrum of any sort, instead of marching straight into doing mode, we simply stopped for a while and did something relaxing?

The ideal answer would not necessarily flash straight into our awareness, but over time, giving ourselves space can act as a gentle cleansing fluid for the lens through which we see the world. Helpfully, it can allow fresh perspectives to come into focus.

This approach requires patience, an asset that find myself in short supply of these days. I would very much like a quick, easy and painless resolution of my doubts and anxieties (who wouldn’t?) but I’m beginning to experience short intervals of relative tranquillity during which it suddenly seems like letting answers unfold in their own time would not be the worst thing in the world. It’s no surprise that these tend to occur when I’m letting my mind rest in some way and they are often aided by music, movement, nature and flowing water.

For an ever-growing portion of the world’s population, the reason for most of life’s conundrums appears to be not doing the right thing or simply not doing enough. In an attempt to solve our problems, we repeatedly search for a step we can take that will make things better.

Action can be incredibly helpful, but it may be time we took less of it, and instead turned our attention to its largely ignored and underrated cousin, Restfulness.

If it brings us nothing more than a little more peace and joy, that’s probably enough, don’t you think?