I celebrated a milestone birthday recently and to mark the occasion my phenomenal colleagues gave me the best gift a girl could ask for: mindfulness. Okay so they couldn’t exactly trap mindfulness in a box, tie a ribbon around it and hand it to me, but they gave me the next best thing: a yoga class on Pier A. Grass, sky, warrior pose. The teacher even dug up tunes that topped the charts in my birth year. It was ahhmazing.
Like everyone else in 2014, I grapple with the seemingly never-ending stream of digital messages and the monster “to do” list. I recognize that it’s critical to take time out for deep breathing and physical activity – to truly focus – but it’s tough to find that precious time. A mommy blogger I follow says, “I used to run marathons now I run errands.” Testify. Everyone needs to find space in the day because ultimately that time away – whether it’s five minutes or an hour – comes back as more powerful, focused, productive energy. Easier said than done, of course.
Tom Kelley, partner at IDEO and co-author of Creative Confidence, talks about “relaxed attention.” They’re rebranding daydreaming because daydreaming gets a bad rap. Of course they are. He talks about “holding an idea gently” and disengaging to capture more of the value your brain is producing in those moments and to increase creative yield.
He points to the shower and the commute as places where this can happen, but for me it’s triggered during and after exercise once I’ve had an opportunity to disconnect and reboot. Gentle, flowing movements and intentional breathing work well, but so does vigorous exercise – like the City Challenge my colleagues and I took on recently. For the uninitiated: it’s an urban obstacle race – think Tough Mudder minus the mud and electrocution. Again, Pier A was the venue – apparently the place where all good things happen.
I feel very fortunate to have such tuned in, generous colleagues. Whether hurdling cop cars or assuming tree pose, we’re on a quest to achieve that elusive state of relaxed attention and to properly nourish our work and our lives.
What do you do to restore balance and replenish your well of energy?