Last weekend a
friend of mine was visiting from out of town.
On Friday we drove to a nearby town to visit our local astrologer, have
lunch, and shop in some antique stores. Around
here, any trip beyond the outskirts of Iowa City involves traveling on a two-lane
highway surrounded by vast open rolling cornfields. I
still can’t get over it, and I moved here from New England, where all you ever
see is trees growing right up to the edge of the road, almost twenty-five years
ago. When I lived in Massachusetts I breathed a sigh of relief every time I got
to the edge of the ocean. And now the
same thing happens – my entire being breathes some metaphysical sigh of relief
-- whenever I drive along those country roads, open fields spreading out as far
as the eye can see in every direction, the fields meeting the edge of the wide
blue sky out on the horizon, cumulous clouds towering overhead. When you look in the rearview mirror you see
the two-lane highway slipping away behind you, it too surrounded by fields and
sky, reflected in the mirror.
I love all the
open space out here. It turns out I
crave open spaces.
I crave open spaces
in my life too – chunks of time when I don’t have to do anything. Time to
think, time to be, time to stop focusing on the busy insistent outside world
and what it wants and needs from me. Time
to connect with some larger smarter wider more expansive part of myself. Open spaces are crucial to writers – we write
during open spaces and writing itself is a kind of opening that requires space
to open into. But I’m absolutely
convinced that everyone needs open spaces in their days, in their lives, that some
deep crucial part of us craves them and needs them. Needs
them the way the body needs essential nutrients, craves them the way I crave the
sight of open fields and sky and water. And
it’s a lot harder to get those open spaces than it seems like it would or
should be.
I’m busy like everyone
else these days, of course, and it’s not that easy to find time to do nothing. I have to make the time, believe I should and
deserve to make the time, and then I have to hold onto the time once I’ve made
it. And even if I do all that, I’m not
necessarily guaranteed an open space. I’ve
come to believe that the problem – and therefore the solution – to not having
open spaces in our lives isn’t just a matter of how much time we have and don’t
have. I think it’s also – maybe even mostly -- a
matter of how we think. That we can
ruin whatever open spaces we have by filling them up with thoughts: thoughts about how busy we are, what we have
to do later, what we should be doing now instead of what we’re doing, even
thoughts about how well we’re using this open time, worries that we’re wasting
it -- not to mention thoughts about our partners, children, jobs, finances, you
name it.
Years ago, when I
had all my time to write, I could sometimes get so uptight about what I had to
do later it would actually interfere with my ability to sit there and
concentrate now. I was only able to write for a few hours on any given day (any
more than four hours at a stretch and you start to ruin it instead of making it
better), but I had to feel like I had all
my time that day to write in order to be able to do it. I also felt tense, to the point where I could
barely write, if I thought someone was going to call me or I was going to have
some other interruption during my writing time.
Now I don’t have all my time to write and I don’t have the luxury of
letting my thoughts ruin whatever open spaces I’ve got for it. I’ve had to learn how and where to fit those open
spaces into my life and how to stick to them after I’ve created them. And I’ve had to learn how to make use of my
open spaces when I get them, to stop thinking about what wants to interrupt me,
forget about whatever I think is trying to crowd out my time. If possible, during my open spaces, I stop
thinking all together.
My
open-space-making isn’t easy and it’s not perfect. But on most days I do make some open space to
write: When I plan my day I schedule in some
writing time and I try to stick to that time.
I wish I had longer writing times -- in fact I’m working on
consolidating the other things I do to make longer writing times; I can feel
the greediness in me for those longer open spaces even as I write this. (It occurs to me that one of the reasons I
chose to be a writer is that it gives me an excuse, even an obligation, to keep
those open spaces in my life.) For now
my writing times are what they are and I do my best to make good use of them,
and I make a concerted effort not to give them away when something else comes
along, even something that feels kind of urgent. I also make open spaces when I’m not writing
– I write them right down on my daily planning calendar: times when I don’t have to do anything but
think, stare out the window, nap, read a book.
The longer I’ve been harnessing time the more I value those rest times,
and new research even shows that rest and renewal times are necessary for
optimal productivity. (See Relaxing,
Renewing, and Refreshing the Mind.)
And every day, for
ten minutes, I make an open space in which I meditate. I sit in a comfortable chair, close my eyes,
and try to listen to the sounds around me, and when thoughts arise I picture
them falling like ashes to the bottom of my inner picture. When I can stop thinking, even for a few
seconds, something sweet, happy, expansive opens up inside my mind, and
afterwards I feel just a little bit better all day long than I do if I didn’t
take that ten minutes to meditate. (See The
Power of Ten Minutes.)
I sort of believe
that any time you open up some space inside yourself, you make it easier to do
it again (the way any time you work out at the gym it’s easier to do it the
next time you go to the gym), and that whatever little bit of openness you’ve managed
to create lingers like a whiff of fresh air – like a good scent from a strange
mountain, to quote Robert Olen Butler – that wends its way into the rest of
your being-alive space, making it just a little bit less crowded and busy in
there. So even if you can only give yourself ten minutes of open space a day,
and even if you can only stop thinking and listen to the sounds around you for
a few seconds during that time, it really does matter. It can be one of the best uses you’ll ever
find for ten minutes, one of the best ways you can harness time to do something
for yourself.
--
Mary Allen
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