I’m laying on a heating pad, playing with a contemplative exercise a teacher I regard highly gave to a group years ago. I am one of two people in that group who actually did the exercise I think, much less two or three times.

Each time was revelatory.

It is a surprisingly radical act to consciously do nothing*.

The basics of the exercise are as follows:
–Ask yourself the question “How does my life seem to me now?” Then write for five minutes.
–Next, *do nothing*, for three to four hours, not even meditate. (My version today will not be this long; we’ll call it a micro-contemplation.)
–At the end, you ask yourself the same question. Then write for five minutes.

This can be a kind of ‘state of things’ address to one’s self, although there is no need to answer in an itemized kind of way. The main thing is to experience/compare the way one’s mind behaves with less or more spaciousness. Today is a perfect day for something like this, as it’s breezy and cool outside, George is content to be a foot warmer, and I’ve been staving off anxiety.


*leaving aside the question of whether this kind of doing nothing is actually doing nothing. It is closer to doing nothing that what one normally does, hahaha