Do you think that Busyness means success? At one point I thought that successful were busy; however, that has changed.
You know how you have those moments in life where you stand
still and it as if time has frozen. You look around and see everyone rushing.
Cars are flying past, people dash and everyone is frantically tapping their
mobiles. In that moment of stillness I wondered what people were rushing towards
because there is only one ultimate destination: death. So with that as the
destination then why rush?
That one epiphany made me think. I sat at my desk watching
numerous emails ping into my inbox. I watched a colleague balancing numerous
projects and glanced at my manager who was trying to answer emails whilst
answering questions on a conference call. Everyone was so busy. It was then I
realised how we are conditioned to think that busy-ness is business. Being busy
all the time is not success – it is stress. Maybe busyness should be re-named
busy-stress. It is ridiculous.
That evening I met up with some of my ex-rowing crew
members. These girls are hardcore dedicated athletes. We used to train around
20 hours a week to compete and we all worked full time too. They left the
competitive arena of rowing and funnily enough most of them have become
endurance sea swimmers. I feel that you may have an idea of their mentality:
very focused – work hard, train hard and be very busy. So I raised the busyness
issue. Why are we all so busy? I advised them that I craved time to be silent
and do nothing and not be with anyone. They were horrified and asked why would
I want to spend time alone? My response was ‘because that is how I recharge.’
One of them shook her head sadly and said she hated being alone. In fact she
avoided it. She said she trained hard to physical exhaustion and went home and
slept. I was stunned and looked at the rest of the group who all agreed. So I
had to get it straight – ‘so you are all keeping yourself busy and exhausting
yourselves to avoid feeling lonely?’ There was silence and they all nodded.
Each explained their stories. Two were in relationships and gave examples of
what they did when their partners were away to avoid feeling lonely – usually hold
a dinner party or get friends over. I wondered why people assumed that when
they were alone they would get lonely. It then occurred to me that our society
is over-stimulating us and people actually are not resting through fear of
being alone or feeling lonely. That night was quite an insight into ten women’s
inner lives.
Over the next weeks, something about this lurked in the back
of my mind. It was as if something was brewing. So I wondered whether when I
was alone for an extended period I would feel lonely. I will be honest I have
never even considered that. So I took some time out of my busy schedule and
spent four whole days alone and guess what? It was bliss! Ha! Hence less blogs
than usual. The plan was not to do, tidy, clean. Instead I was able to just do
nothing a duvet day. Of course there was a lot of sleep, meditation and just
doing nothing. At times I felt guilty for not being productive. That concerned
me – why do I always have to be productive? The thing is in that ‘empty’ time
my creative juices flowed. I had times where I was bored and day dreamed and
came up with some wonderful ideas to write. It was then that I realised that
busyness distracts us from real success. Are you ready for this and this is
what I realised – for me – the true success is a feeling of peace and tranquillity
whilst feeling connected to the self. When you reach this state you are able to
jump into a creative mental pool and have the energy to create/ be productive
rather than forcing. In addition in this state one radiates and feels happy.
Imagine. So my lovelies my new attitude is do less but strangely achieve more.
I hope this inspires
You can find my books at the following link: Ruby Allure books on Audible:
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