It has been quiet at beyondibd.com in the last month or so, following my novel writing month in November. The title of this post may give you some idea why - I have been exploring the art of idleness.
Why practise idleness?
Often I find myself being caught up in day-to-day practicalities, trudging through my list of tasks on autopilot. My view becomes limited and I only see what I have to do next, or today or this week. The future is a cloud of commitments and responsibilities, many undefined, which I avoid examining for fear of what I might find. Despite my efforts to ignore it, the cloud is menacing and suffocating. I am in a constant state of readiness, thinking about all the things I have to do, could do or might want to do. It becomes mental ‘white noise’.
It is very important to recognise this state and understand that it is both unhealthy and unproductive. Constant levels of stress and adrenalin weaken your body (wasting energy which would be better spent keeping you well!), and your clouded mind is an ineffective problem-solver and decision maker. At this point you may feel helpless and hopeless.
Idleness involves slowing down and restoring your reserves - physical, mental and emotional. After the right kind of idleness (more on this below), you will feel rested, be able to think more imaginatively about your life and any challenges you may be facing, and have a more optimistic view of your future.
‘Right’ kind of idleness
There are plenty of negative connotations associated with ‘idleness’. The Concise Oxford Dictionary mentions ineffective, worthless, useless and lazy.
In If you want to write (1938) Brenda Ueland offers many sound observations on the creative process. Her thoughts on idleness are excellent and not limited to artists - we all need imagination in our lives.
… nervous, empty, continually willing action is sterile and the faster you run and accomplish a lot of useless things, the more you are dead… do not feel, any more, guilty about idleness and solitude…
If your idleness is a complete slump, that is, indecision, fretting, worry, or due to over-feeding and physical mugginess, that is bad, terrible and utterly sterile. Or if it is that idleness which so many people substitute for creative idleness, such as gently feeding into their minds all sorts of printed bilge… that is too bad and utterly uncreative.
But if it is the dreamy idleness that children have, an idleness when you walk along for a long, long time, or take a long, dreamy time at dressing, or lie in bed at night and thoughts come and go, or dig in a garden, or drive a car for many hours alone, or play the piano, or sew, or paint alone… This quiet looking and thinking is the imagination; it is letting in ideas…
Paraphrased from If you want to write (1938)
You will know the right kind of idleness by how you feel. When I have been slumped in front of the television or hunched over my PC, aimlessly surfing channels or websites (which I am sure Ueland would categorise as bilge), I do not feel rejuvenated. I feel irritable, mind-numbed, dull and somewhat resentful, as though I have been used. Whereas, if I were to spend some time sitting in a park, going for a walk, watching my cats or having a slow and satisfying cup of tea, I feel much better.
Idleness may involve doing absolutely nothing, a kind of meditation. But it needn’t be like that all the time. To me, idleness is about intention, about being quietly in the moment without filling your mind with the next productive thing you could/should do, about having the cup of tea without thinking “I could pop a load of laundry on while I am sitting here”.
Idleness is about quieting the mental white noise - not by attempting to drown it out with more noise (TV, internet, gaming) but by being still (or simply unhurried), releasing yourself of the need to be constantly ‘productive’ and doing. When you try this at first the white noise may become louder - angrily buzzing all the important things you should be doing rather than wasting useful time. But you are not a slave to this noise, and you do not have to argue with it, simply turn your back and continue to be idle.
When you are idle
In the time, space and silence you create for yourself (for idleness is best practised alone) you will, at the very least, give your body the opportunity to restore itself. You may also find, without willing it so, that you gain greater clarity about why you choose to do what you do, and about what you really want to spend time doing in the future. With clarity comes calm and peace.
And so I hope you made time for idleness this holiday season and, if not, it’s not too late. Take an afternoon, or better a whole day, and forbid yourself from all ‘productive’ tasks. Daydream and dabble and wander and snooze and become very languid and soft. And practise this often, for no particular reason and with no particular end in mind, simply because it feels right.
Rebecca
This article was posted on 1 January, 2008
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